Nuclear Power & Radiation

"LOS ANGELES -- A federal board Friday ordered the operator of a shuttered nuclear power plant in California to turn over dozens of pages of documents that were withheld when the company submitted a plan to restart one of its damaged twin reactors."

"ATLANTA -- If disaster strikes a nuclear power plant in the U.S., the utility industry wants the ability to fly in heavy-duty equipment that could avert a meltdown."

"French utility EDF has raised the cost of the construction of its next-generation nuclear reactor by more than 2 billion euros on Monday, the latest in a series of overruns for the first EPR reactor built in France."

"Japanese voters look likely to hand victory to a party that favors nuclear power in the first election since the March 2011 Fukushima radiation disaster -- a result a baffled Greenpeace activist likens to one of the 'wonders of the world.'"

"The Department of Energy has reduced the 586 square miles of Hanford requiring environmental cleanup to 161 square miles. In three more years, the land requiring cleanup could be little more than the 75 square miles at Hanford's center as DOE works to complete cleanup outlined in its 2015 Vision, an ambitious plan for work to be completed by the end of 2015."

"Federal appeals court judges today indicated that environmental groups may face an uphill battle in challenging the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's approval of a reactor design and the country's first new nuclear construction in more than three decades."

"VISAGINAS, Lithuania -- The parking lot outside the atomic power plant is weedy and potholed. Bus stops that once teemed with hundreds of workers are eerily empty."

"Korea counts on nuclear energy for 30 percent of its electrical power, but critics are now demanding that the government rethink plans to build more."

"Japanese citizens are balking at the lack of information and supervision of waste stored in public places, such as playgrounds."