Nuclear Power & Radiation

"While the continuing environmental disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi plant has grabbed world headlines — with hundreds of tons of contaminated water flowing into the Pacific Ocean daily — a human crisis has been quietly unfolding. Two and a half years after the plant belched plumes of radioactive materials over northeast Japan, the almost 83,000 nuclear refugees evacuated from the worst-hit areas are still unable to go home."

"Federal judges [Wednesday] posed stiff questions to Department of Energy officials on why the agency continues to collect fees for disposing of nuclear waste even though it has no operating national repository."

"It would be one of the largest nuclear weapons investments since World War II. A watchdog group says the work -- which may not be needed -- can be done for less elsewhere."

"Japanese authorities, now struggling to contain leaks of radioactive groundwater from the wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant, were urged two years ago by U.S. experts to take immediate steps to prevent groundwater contamination but decided not to act on the advice."

"LOS ALAMOS, N.M. -- At Los Alamos National Laboratory, a seven-year, $213 million upgrade to the security system that protects the lab's most sensitive nuclear bomb-making facilities doesn't work. Those same facilities, which sit atop a fault line, remain susceptible to collapse and dangerous radiation releases, despite millions more spent on improvement plans."

"Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Monday it has released rainwater that accumulated during a typhoon between barriers around storage tanks at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant complex to prevent the water overflowing."

"Japan is on the verge of being without nuclear power again with the scheduled shutdown of Kansai Electric Power Co.'s No. 4 reactor at the Oi power plant for a regular safety inspection."

"WASHINGTON -- Newly obtained government documents are prompting concern among critics that Environmental Protection Agency officials are seeking to use the organization’s new guide for nuclear-incident response to relax public health standards, but the agency is denying the claim."

"The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff said there were no safety issues that would preclude a 20-year license renewal for FirstEnergy Corp's 894-megawatt Davis-Besse nuclear power plant in Ohio."

"Japanese authorities are unable to control the radioactive water leaking out of the damaged Fukushima nuclear power plant. Now the government plans to install a wall of ice around the facility to contain the contaminated water. Ed Lyman, from the Union of Concerned Scientists, tells host Steve Curwood that the new ice wall plan is likely an act of desperation, and that some American reactors are at risk for the same kind of flooding disaster."