Nuclear Hotseat

INTERVIEW: 

Dr. Lloyd C. Williams is an organizational psychologist, coach and management consultant to Fortune 100-level companies.  Dr Williams has accomplished and led programs as chair and professor at UC Berkeley, the Universities of Notre Dame, Massachusetts,  Grenoble Business School, the International School of Management and the University of Singapore.  He coined the term "organizational psychosis," and helps us understand in clinical terms just what dysfunctions have taken root within the nuclear industry.  What he has to say not explores the problem, but offers key insights on how we as a movement might strategize to turn nuclear around.

Contact:  http://www.drlloydcwilliams.com/

NUMNUTZ OF THE WEEK:

FUKUSHIMA -- The Tourist Destination!

IAEA Executives form the first group of tourists to visit Fukushima-land. Leave only footprints, take only memories!

or

Chairman of Oregon Republican Party wanted to put radioactive material from San Onofre into drinking water!  ("Drink your radionuclides, darling, they're good for you, helps build strong bones that glow in the dark.")

PLUS:

• No States Rights for Vermont when it comes to Vermont Yankee;
• Fukushima governor labels radioactive water pouring into the Pacific Ocean a "national emergency;"
• November fuel rod removal from Fukushima Spent Fuel Pool 4 requires sophisticated new TEPCO technology:

TEPCO's new technology for removing fuel rods from Fukushima's Spent Fuel Pool 4.

• TEPCO goes to Hanford to learn about radioactive waste control ;
• 100% of Canadian herring in test found to be hemorrhaging from fins, bellies chins, eyeballs.
• Canadian public health official claims Fukushima's radiation "Does not concern Canadian officials."  Obviously!
• Salmon disappearing from Canada, Alaska, Russia -- and Arnie Gundersen predicted it!
• And Indian Point reactor, only 30 miles from midtown Manhattan, given permission to keep running after its license expires in September.  Do you think they'd do that for my car, too?

LINKS:

• Update on one sailor from the USS Ronald Regan, who has all the symptoms of radiation contamination but cannot get a diagnosis from government doctors.  Shades of Japan! http://bit.ly/127vQg7
• "Abe's Japan Blind to Scary Nuclear Reality" - http://on.fb.me/1f1nOIs
• Online book:  Fukushima: A Nuclear War Without a War  - http://bit.ly/T6H4yD

The Future of Art in a Post-Fukushima World

INTERVIEW: 

Closing down San Onofre didn't end the southern California nuclear battle, it just shifted focus.  Gene Stone of Residents Organized for a Safe Environment, talks about how the problems of decommissioning, those pesky spent fuel rods, and some surprising news about fuel radiation levels lead to a regrouping of activists and the upcoming Symposium on Decommissioning San Onofre and the Ongoing Dangers of Nuclear Waste -- a foretaste of what others will be going through when their local nuclear reactor shuts down.

BONUS:  Joseph Mangano of Radiation and Public Health in a presentation on the impact of Fukushima on American health.  This is an encore taken from his speech at Dr. Helen Caldicott's Symposium on the Medical and Ecological Consequences of the Fukushima Nuclear Disaster.  What problems were faced by researchers trying to get the word out?  And how bad did it get -- and is it getting -- in the U.S.?

PLUS:

• TEPCO Radwater releasing BILLIONS of Bequerels of cesium per liter - directly into the Pacific Ocean and the groundwater at Fukushima;
• Fukushima workers accuse TEPCO of lying about water leak for 27 months;
• US Federal court commands Yucca Mountain be opened for radwaste storage ;
• Evil propaganda video aimed at convincing Japanese children that Fukushima just had a little belly ache with its poo.
• And Japan in total breakdown of sanity with FOUR, count them, FOUR Numnutz of the Week!  Numnutzes of the Week?  FOUR!
• Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe eats a Fukushima peach with two Fukushima "peaches."  (Yes, I know it's sexist, but c'mon, these people are going publicly insane!)

LINKS:

• Dr. Helen Caldicott's Symposium on the Medical and Ecological Consequences of the Fukushima Nuclear Disaster  - link to video of the full two-day conference:  http://www.totalwebcasting.com/view/?id=hcf" class="text-nh underline hover:text-nh-dark">          http://www.totalwebcasting.com/view/?id=hcf
• Japanese children's propaganda cartoon.  Heinous:
•  Coalition Against Nukes map of activists: www.CoalitionAgainstNukes.org
• Joe Mangano and Radiation and Public Health: www.Radiation.org.

BONUS:  Nancy Burton's got  EPA head Gina McCarthy's Goat (...and her name was Katie.):

http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/08/12/gina-mccarthy-and-katie-the-goat/

Hiroshima Peace Park's one remaining building from ground zero, August 6, 1945.

INTERVIEWS:

Carole Hisasue left a successful media career in Japan for an idyllic life in America... but landed within six miles of the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant.  Now active with San Luis Obispo Nothers for Peace (SLOMP), she talks about this year's northern California Hiroshima commemoration, including a Peace Walk with Buddhist Reverend Gyosen Sawada; a talk by Chikako Nishiyama, a former government official from Fukushima Prefecture; and Cecile Pineda, author of Devil's Tango: How I learned the Fukushima Step by Step.

Then Chikako Nishiyama gives a harrowing account of her experience in the hours and days immediately after the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster began... and the chilling way she first suspected that there was a problem at the nuclear power plant.  (HINT: The government and TEPCO weren't exactly forthcoming!)  Powerful, deeply moving first-hand account from a Fukushima survivor.  

Chikako Nishiyama

NUMNUTZ OF THE WEEK:

Dual award: to Prof. Eric Norman, University of California Berkeley School of Nuclear Engineering, for claiming, "No matter what happens in Fukushima, it's not going to be a problem over here" - - when his school measured radiation in California milk, produce and rainwater; and for EPA Spokesmodel David Yogi, who assures us that "Any kind of (radioactive) release in Japan would be non-detectable here."    To check out how badly these two are deluding themselves (I hesitate to call them liars because they may simply be mentally ill), go to:

http://enenews.com/shock-uc-berkeley-professor-claims-no-matter-what-happens-in-fukushima-its-not-going-to-be-a-problem-over-here

and check out any of the links that discuss ocean transport of contamination from the Fukushima nuclear plant to North America.

PLUS:

• TEPCO admits radiation at Fukushima up 47 TIMES since just last week and they haven't a clue why; company admits the situation is "bleak;" 
• Japanese government allows Fukushima residents to "come home" (for what, to get more radiation exposure?);
• TEPCO games leukemia compensation program for workers so only four of almost 10,000 qualify;
• Palisades NPP in Michigan leaks radioactive water into Lake Michigan - again;
• Farley in Alabama at ALERT when former award-winning thermal seals prove defective;
• St. Louis landfill fire breaches fire line on way to nuclear waste dump;
• Duke cancels Levy in Florida but ratepayers sucked dry to the tune of $300 million;
• and the nuclear fight in Taiwan gets physical.

LINKS: 

•  Robert Trigaux writes a blistering column for TampaBay.com on how Duke Energy scammed Florida taxpayers out of up to $1.5 billion in the Levy NPP scam:http://www.tampabay.com/news/business/energy/thank-you-tallahassee-for-making-us-pay-so-much-for-nothing/2134390
• "The Legacy of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty by Joseph J. Mangano and Janette D. Sherman, M.D.: 
  http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/08/05/the-legacy-of-the-comprehensive-test-ban-treaty/

"Fukushima is Here" mock-up - help make the real thing happen on October 19!

FEATURED INTERVIEW:  John Bertucci, one of the organizers of the "Fukushima is Here" campaign, on what it takes to set up a 2,000-person human billboard on a beach... and how you can do it, too, as part of an international planned October 19 action. 

Close-up of a "human billboard" in progress.

BONUS ENCORE INTERVIEW: 

Daniel Hirsch, a lecturer on nuclear policy at University of California, Santa Cruz and President of Committee to Bridge the Gap, talks about the nuclear accident you most likely have never heard of -- The Santa Susana Field Lab core meltdown in 1959.  It's the worst nuclear reactor accident in US history – worse even than Three Mile Island – and it was completely hidden from the public for over 20 years.  This is a replay of Nuclear Hotseat's interview with the man who was most intimiately involved with revealing the cover-up and breaking the story. 

Daniel Hirsch

NUMNUTZ OF THE WEEK:  Alaska Airlines thinks its flight attendants' mysterious illnesses -- rashes, headaches, hair loss, respiratory problems -- have been caused by their new uniforms, first introduced in January, 2011.  Nobody bothered to look at the timing as being coincidental with the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster and subsequent radiation plume.  So they spent $5 million replacing the uniforms!  Has nobody ever noticed that each of those symptoms is consistent with radiation exposure?

Flying the radiation-plumed skies?

PLUS:

• TEPCO fakes its apologies with help from its cronies;
• WHO refuses to consider depleted uranium as a possible cause of Iraqi mutations;
• Indian Point supervisor arrested for deliberately falsifying critical safety records
• Idle No More! - First Nation activists instrumental in blocking Great Lakes transport of radioactive steam generators to Sweden;
• South Carolina REFUSES to become a nuclear waste dump;
•  San Onofre fuel removed from reactor in record time, effectively terminating SCE's license - WOO HOO! 

FEATURED INTERVIEW:  Chuck McCune, veteran disaster preparedness pro, talks about the nuclear aspects to natural disaster, including some projections FEMA never intended to get out to the public.  Chuck includes his vision of what it would take to make the anti-nuclear movement in the US REALLY effective. 

NUMNUTZ OF THE WEEK:

Cluster of horrible birth defects in three Washington state counties and government officials can't figure out what might be causing them... DESPITE one of the counties also hosting one of the 10 most polluted places on the planet:  The Hanford Site.  Can you say, "DUH!" 

PLUS: 

• Former San Onofre partners SCE, SDG&E and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries battling it out over who owes who what for those faulty steam generators that got the site SHUT DOWN FOREVER;
• Fukushima #3 blowing off steam, meaning it's hot enough inside to boil radioactive water;

Fukushima Daiichi Unit 3 releasing steam.    July 18, 2013

• Ft. Calhoun may force Omaha Public Power District to get moody about a Moody's rating cut; 
• Japan elects a no-nukes actor to Upper House but supports pro-nuke LDP, despite the fact that 80% of the population believes a new nuclear disaster "probable;"
• And the Vermont Yankee "Shut It Down!" affinity group demonstrates and gets arrested again, which they seem to do every 28 days... 

IT'S THAT TIME OF THE MONTH: Members of Vermont Yankee women's "Shut It Down" affinity group protesting before their monthly arrest.

LINKS:

• NIRS (Nuclear Information and Resource Service) pdf on reactors due for retirement, "Renaissance in Reverse." http://www.nirs.org/reactorwatch/aging/renaissanceinreverse71713.pdf
• WHO (World Health Organization) news release from the end of May: http://articles.latimes.com/2012/jun/01/science/la-sci-sn-world-cancer-incidence-20120601