Monthly Archives: October 2008

Global Strike Command: Safeguarding nuclear weapons

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B-52 bomber abc news

The US Air Force (USAF) is planning to set up a new Global Strike Command for its nuclear weapons as part of a re-organisation after recent mishaps. The move follows the discovery that six nuclear weapons were mistakenly flown across the US, and that nuclear missile fuses were sent unknowingly to Taiwan. The blunders resulted in the sacking of two of USAF's most senior officials.

A three-star general will head the new command, part of a project aimed at shaking up USAF's nuclear mission. "This is a critical milestone for us. It's a new starting point for reinvigoration of this enterprise," said Air Force Secretary Michael Donley. "It is an extremely important mission for the United States Air Force."

In June, Gen T Michael Moseley, USAF chief of staff, and Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne were both asked to resign by Defence Secretary Robert Gates after a report revealed that the security of US nuclear weapons and parts had been in question. The report cited two embarrassing incidents.

The first occurred in 2006 when electrical fuses for ballistic missiles were mistakenly sent from a US base in Wyoming to Taiwan in place of helicopter batteries. The Chinese government, which vehemently opposes US arms sales to Taiwan and has threatened to attack the island if it declares independence, was informed by the US about the error.

The other embarrassing incident occurred last year when a B-52 bomber mistakenly armed with six nuclear-tipped cruise missiles flew across the country, without anyone realising the weapons were on board. The new Global Strike Command will be established by September 2009, said officials. Control of all nuclear-capable B-52 and B-2 bombers and intercontinental ballistic missiles will be shifted to the new command. Officials did not disclose the location of the new command or how much the re-organisation would cost.

Excerpt: US plans separate nuclear command, BBC News, October 25, 2008 

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Safeguarding Enriched Uranium: A Fence and a Guard?

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enriched uranium seized by slovak police 2007

Enough processed uranium to make six nuclear weapons was secretly transported thousands of miles by truck, rail and ship on a monthlong trip from a research reactor in Budapest, Hungary, to a facility in Russia so it could be more closely protected against theft, U.S. officials revealed Wednesday.The shipment, conducted under tight secrecy and security, included a three-week trip by cargo ship through the Mediterranean, up the English Channel and the North Sea to Russia's Arctic seaport of Murmansk, the only port Russia allows for handling nuclear material.

The 13 radiation-proof casks, each weighing 17,000 pounds, arrived by rail at the secure nuclear material facility at Mayak in Siberia on Wednesday, carrying 341 pounds of weapons usable uranium, said Kenneth Baker, a National Nuclear Security Administration official who oversaw the complex project. It is the largest recovery to date of highly enriched uranium provided either by the former Soviet Union or the United States under a program, begun in the 1950s, aimed at spreading the peaceful use of nuclear energy. The two countries have been working to return the spent fuel from reactors around the world because at many of the facilities, including the one in Budapest, security is lax, raising the possibility of the material being stolen by terrorists.

"It was a big shipment, the biggest one we've ever done," Baker said in an interview with The Associated Press hours after he received word that the shipment had arrived at its final destination in Russia. "It was basically enough to make six nuclear weapons."  Under the U.S.-Russian program, the NNSA, which is part of the Energy Department, has completed 15 recoveries of U.S.-origin highly enriched uranium from research reactors in more than a dozen countries since 2005. The agency also was involved in three earlier shipments of Russian-origin highly enriched uranium that were removed from the Czech Republic, Latvia and Bulgaria and returned to Russia.

But the project targeting the 341 pounds of highly radioactive used fuel from the Budapest research reactor was particularly complex and challenging, said Baker, the NNSA's assistant deputy administrator for defense nuclear nonproliferation.  It began at 3 a.m. in Budapest in late September and ended early Wednesday, Washington time, at the nuclear facility at Mayak in Russian Siberia. In between the shipment moved without notice aboard truck and rail to the port of Koper in Slovenia and then by special cargo ship through the ocean shipping lanes that encircle Europe, always staying in international waters at least 12 miles from shore, according to Baker.

The unusual roundabout route was needed because "we couldn't ship it through Ukraine" even though that would have been a more direct route to Russia, Baker said.  So in the early hours in late September, the 13 casks were secretly loaded onto trucks at the Budapest facility and taken to the city's train station, where it was transported onto a special train — one cask per car — for an eight-hour trip to the port of Koper in Slovenia on the Adriatic Sea.

The shipments then moved through the Mediterranean, through the Strait of Gibraltar, up the Atlantic and into the English Channel, the North and Norwegian seas and then on to Murmansk by Saturday. From there the shipment was loaded on a train for the long trip to Siberia.  "It was the most complicated trip we've ever taken by far," said Baker, who oversaw the loading and early part of the shipment but did not accompany the shipment after it went to sea, instead returning to Washington.Early Wednesday, he received notice that the shipment had arrived at Mayak, where security is far tighter than in Budapest.

In Budapest "they had a fence and a guard," said Baker, although some security improvements have been made with U.S. help over the past year. Still, Baker added, "you don't want to leave it there."  The Hungarian reactor now is being converted to use low-enriched uranium that can't be used in a weapon and won't be a potential terrorist target.

So far, including the shipment from Budapest, 1,685 pounds of Russian-origin uranium has been retrieved from 11 countries. But there are still a significant number of reactors that have either U.S. or Russian highly enriched uranium, including some with security far less than what is desirable, according to nuclear nonproliferation activists.

Excerpt, H. Josef Hebert, Official describes secret uranium shipment, Associated Press, October 22, 2008

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Protecting the Amazon of the Seas

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Six Asia-Pacific nations which make up the Coral Triangle have agreed to a new plan aimed at protecting marine species.  At a meeting in Manila, officials from Indonesia, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, Solomon Islands and East Timor agreed to sign the Coral Reefs, Fisheries, and Food Securities Plan of Action.

The draft document maps out a series of steps to protect, preserve and promote coral reefs and the marine species they nurture.  The document states that "marine and coastal resources are under significant and increasing threat" and that the coral triangle "sits at a crossroads of rapidly expanding populations, economic growth and international trade."

Dubbed the Amazon of the Seas, the Coral Triangle covers 5.7 million square kilometers where the Indian and Pacific Oceans meet and contains 33 percent of the world's coral reefs, 76 percent of known coral species, 37 percent of known coral reef fish species and the world's greatest extent of mangrove forests. Some 600 species of reef-building coral can be found in the Coral Triangle.  Coral reefs in the region are threatened by human impact including overpopulation, pollution, overfishing, tourism, global warming, coastal development and scuba diving.

...

Hopefully the document will be implemented--not just be shelved...

Excerpt from: Evan T. Allard, Coral triangle nations to protect marine species, CDNN News Network, Oct. 24, 2008

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Nuclear waste from Taiwan, the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Canada, Mexico and Brazil to the United States

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Even as debate has roiled for months over a proposal to bury radioactive waste from Italy in Utah, plans for a shipment from South America have been quietly in the works.   But the plan to bring in contaminated laundry waste from a nuclear reactor in Brazil appears dead on arrival.   No sooner was the proposal revealed publicly Wednesday than a regional oversight panel made clear its intentions to tell federal regulators the foreign waste won't be allowed at the EnergySolutions Inc. landfill in Tooele County. 

And members of the eight-state group agreed to take a few more steps to make sure that the Salt Lake City nuclear waste company does not bury any more foreign waste at the specialized Utah landfill. -

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Radioactive Waste and Terrorist Attacks

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Federal regulators have ruled that a radioactive waste storage plan can go forward at a California nuclear power plant without further study of whether it's safe from terror attacks.The Nuclear Regulatory Commission voted 3-1 Thursday morning to deny the novel objection from the activist group Mothers for Peace, which had won a federal court ruling forcing NRC to consider its arguments.

The decision OKs PG&E's plans to store spent nuclear fuel in aboveground casks at its Diablo Canyon power plant near San Luis Obispo, Calif.  Dry cask storage is common around the country. Mothers for Peace had contended there wasn't sufficient study of whether the casks could safely withstand terrorism, but the NRC said no more study was needed.

Thinking about terrorist attacks...thinking about the number of nuclear plants and radioactive waste sites that are dispersed throughout the country.

.....

Excerpt, Erica Werner, Feds reject protest to nuke waste storage plan, Associated Press, October 23, 2008

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What goes around comes around: radioactive scrap on elevator buttons

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India's nuclear authorities have admitted radioactive scrap was exported from the country to make lift buttons in France.  French firm Mafelec sent thousands of lift buttons to the elevator maker Otis, which put them in hundreds of lifts in the country over the summer.  Otis said it removed the buttons after France's nuclear safety authority (ASN) announced this week that 20 workers who handled them were exposed to doses of radioactivity ranging from 1 to 3 millisievert (mSv). The French legal limit for people who do not work in the nuclear industry is 1mSv per year.

The ASN said it had classified the incident at Mafelec as level two on the international nuclear event scale. The scale goes from zero, which means no safety risk, to seven, which means a major accident.  The safety agency said the buttons contained traces of radioactive cobalt-60. Four Indian firms made the components, an Indian official said. It was unclear where the contaminated scrap originated – although metal was traced to a foundry in the western state of Maharashtra.

Malafec bought the buttons from two Indian companies that got their raw materials from another company, SKM Steels. In turn, it was supplied by the Vipris foundry near Khopoli on the way to Pune from Mumbai.
"We are tracking back the whole chain," said Satya Pal Agarwal, the head of the radiological safety division of India's atomic energy regulator.  Indian foundries are not required to install radiation detectors to check scrap, but the government has a programme to put radiation monitors at ports to check cargo.

Excerpt, Radioactive scrap from India used to make lift buttons in France:French firm put buttons in hundreds of lifts over the year, Guardian, October 24, 2008

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Russia, Somalia and the Myth of Sovereignty

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Somalia which has been the land for all hazardous and radioactive waste..is allowing Russia in... The following from Reuters:

Russia, which sent a warship to Somalia's coast to combat pirates, asked the African nationon Thursday for carte blanche to use force in its territorial waters.  Last month Moscowsent the frigate "Neustrashimy" -- or "Fearless" -- to the Gulf of Aden, and the Russian navy said at the time that its ships would regularly head to zones where there was a danger from maritime piracy.  Some observers say Russia's navy is being used by the Kremlin to project its renewed power.

"To ensure freedom of actions to fight piracy directly in Somalia's territorial waters, the Foreign Ministry of Russia has requested the agreement of the Interim Federal Government of the Somali Republic to grant the Russian Federation 'cooperating state' status," the ministry said in a statement.  "In cooperation with other nations, the Russian side intends to undertake all measures sanctioned by the United Nations Security Council to improve maritime situation in this region. Russia's navy shipNeustrashimy is already on its way there."

The Gulf of Aden and the east coast of Somalia rank as the top piracy hot spot, accounting for a third of all attacks on ships in the first nine months of 2008, the International Maritime Bureau said earlier on Thursday. In the highest profile case, ransom talks are continuing after pirates seized a Ukrainian ship, the MV Faina, which was loaded with 33 T-72 tanks and other weaponry.

Russia's foreign ministry said it was "deeply concerned" over the fate of the ship's crew, which included three Russian nationals. One of the Russians -- the ship's captain -- has died from cardiovascular disease in captivity.  Earlier this month NATOdespatched warships to the region to help fight piracy and escort U.N. humanitarian aid ships off the coast of Somalia.

Russia Wants to Fight Pirates in Somalia's Waters, Reuters, Oct. 23, 2008

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Climate Change, Adaptation and the Poor in developing countries

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"I used to think adaptation subtracted from our efforts on prevention. But I’ve changed my mind,” says Al Gore, a former American vice-president and Nobel prize-winner. “Poor countries are vulnerable and need our help.” His words reflect a shift in the priorities of environmentalists and economists.

Evidence is growing that climate change hits two specific groups of people disproportionately and unfairly. They are the poorest of the poor and those living in island states: 1 billion people in 100 countries. Tony Nyong, a climate-change scientist in Nairobi, argues that people in poor countries used to see global warming as a Western matter: the rich had caused it and would with luck solve it. But the first impact of global warming has been on the very things the poorest depend on most: dry-land agriculture; tropical forests; subsistence fishing. In a recent paper for the Brookings Institution, a think-tank in Washington DC, Robert Mendelsohn of Yale University estimates that African farmers on rain-fed land will lose $28 per hectare per year for each 1°C rise in global temperatures. Global warming erodes coastlines, spreads pests and water-borne diseases and produces more erratic weather patterns.The victims share two characteristics. They are too poor to defend themselves by expensive flood controls or sophisticated public-health programmes. And (unlike China or Brazil) their own carbon footprints are tiny. Kirk Smith, a professor at the University of California, Berkeley, calls climate change the world’s biggest regressive tax: the poorest pay for the behaviour of the rich.
Despite public-private partnerships and the adaptation fund created at Bali,the money involved is just a puff of smoke. Back-of-the-envelope calculations suggest the cost of coping with climate change is in the tens of billions a year for poor countries. The total pledged to date (cumulatively, not per year) is $300m, of which just 10% has actually been spent. China says rich countries should allocate 0.5% of their national incomes in official aid to help developing countries adapt. But most rich countries are failing to fulfil earlier promises to increase aid for other reasons, so that looks like a non-starter.

The discrepancy means poor countries will end up bearing most of the burden themselves. China has a national climate-change programme with an elaborate series of targets and exhortations to cope. Bangladesh this year put $50m into a national adaptation fund and invited rich countries to add of their plenty. But this sort of thing is much easier for giants like China or large countries like Bangladesh, than it is for poorer Mali or tiny Maldives.

Even if poor countries do get help, there are bound to be fights over how to use it. If sea levels go up, do you build sea walls or rehouse people? If infectious diseases are rising, do you spend money trying to eradicate the worst ones, like malaria, or on health and nutrition in general?

Lastly, the international arrangements that might help sort out some of these disputes are a shambles. Among developing countries, most negotiations on climate change (as on everything else) are led by the big three: China, India and Brazil. But they are large polluters themselves and their interests differ from very poor states and islands. Angus Friday, Grenada’s ambassador to the UN who speaks for island states there, says the states most vulnerable to climate change are least able to participate effectively in climate-change talks.

The poorest lose out in another way. When industrial polluters in emerging markets cut emissions, they are rewarded through Kyoto. But the poorest are not rewarded for the big contribution they could make towards reducing emissions, which is the better management of tropical forests. That is because forests were excluded from Kyoto, to the chagrin of the poor.

Mary Robinson, a former president of Ireland and UN high commissioner for human rights, says that there should be a “rights-based” approach to climate change, meaning poor countries should have some redress under international law for the environmental costs they suffer. This seems like a recipe for alienating rich countries. But it reflects a growing impatience. As the costs of climate change bear down on the poor, so their demands grow that rich countries, which caused most of the problems, should help them cope.

Excerpts from, Climate Change and the Poor: Adapt or Die, Economist, Sept. 13, 2008, at 65.

 

 

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Illicit Markets in Ivory get a Boost from Legal Trade

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Africa's elephants are divided between the savannahs of eastern and southern Africa and the forests of central Africa. Some biologists reckon the forest ones—smaller, with shorter, straighter tusks—may even constitute a distinct species. But not for long, at the latest rate of poaching. The high price of ivory is increasing the incentive to kill elephants everywhere in Africa, and especially in places where there is virtually no law.

The latest reports suggest that the forest elephant population is collapsing on the back of rising Chinese demand for ivory. Some conservationists argue that a recent decision by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) to auction 108 tonnes of stockpiled ivory from southern Africa may be prompting more poaching in central and eastern Africa, as criminals seek to mix illicit ivory in with the legitimate kind. But some economists maintain that the legitimate sale of ivory lowers prices, thus decreasing the incentive to poach. A study of a previous sale of ivory suggested it did not lead to more intensive poaching.

Either way, the Congo basin is “haemorrhaging elephants”, says TRAFFIC, which monitors trade in wildlife. The head of the 790,000-hectare (1,952,000-acre) Virunga National Park in eastern Congo, Emmanuel de Merode, reports that 24 elephants have been poached in his park so far this year. The situation is dire: 2,900 elephants roamed Virunga when Congo became independent in 1960, 400 in 2006, and fewer than 200 today. Most have been poached by militias, particularly Hutu rebels from Rwanda who hack off the ivory and sell it to middlemen in Kinshasa, Congo’s capital, who then smuggle it to China.

Once ivory has left its country of origin, and if it is seized by customs officials, it can be hard to identify its source and those responsible for acquiring it. But forensic help may be at hand. Scientists from the University of Washington are using genetic markers in elephant dung to identify exactly where ivory has been poached. This should help governments in countries such as Tanzania and Zambia, which are capable of catching poachers, but not in anarchic eastern Congo, where 120-odd rangers have been killed in Virunga in recent years trying to protect elephants and gorillas.

With an influx of businessmen and other officials from China engaged in infrastructure projects such as road building and logging, the slaughter is expected to accelerate. Forest elephants may survive in large numbers only in remote protected pockets of the Congo basin, such as the Odzala-Koukoua National Park in Congo-Brazzaville and Minkebe National Park in north-east Gabon.

Excerpt from, Elephants in Congo: Big and Helpless, Economist, Sept. 27, 2008, at 50

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The Militants of the Niger Delta

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Are battles between Nigeria’s armed forces and militants in the Niger Delta pushing the country closer to catastrophe? The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) portrays itself as political organisation that wants a greater share of Nigeria’s oil revenues to go to the impoverished region that sits atop the oil. In fact, it is more of an umbrella organisation for several armed groups, which it sometimes pays in cash or guns to launch attacks. This franchise approach has so far been successful. In three years the group’s orchestrated attacks across the Niger Delta have reduced the country’s oil output by a fifth. The latest estimate is that civil strife may now be losing Nigeria 40% of its output.  

Until recently the militants have tried to avoid a direct fight with the security forces. But this time, after the attack on one of their camps, fighters from various groups sought out and engaged the army in combat. A once disparate array of fighters, often with their own competing agendas, the militant groups are beginning to look more unified.Complicating matters, some army officers, as well as state-level officials, are accused of being in cahoots with the gangs, sharing the proceeds of oil thievery and other criminal ventures. Gun-running is believed to be a big source of MEND’s revenue, as is the oil siphoned from pipelines and sold to refineries overseas. Insiders in the oil industry reckon that as much as 10% of Nigeria’s oil production, worth millions of dollars, is stolen each day. One fear is that a military drive against the militants could split apart the shared monetary goals that have helped to keep the region from spiralling into all-out conflict.

The government is eager to dispel notions of civil war, a particularly sensitive subject since the Niger Delta lies at the heart of the territory that tried to secede from Nigeria in the Biafran civil war in the 1960s. “This is a state of anarchy, a state of violence and insecurity—I really can’t talk about a civil war,” says Dimieari Von Kemedi, a member of government in Bayelsa, one of the Delta states. Bayelsa, which has its fair share of armed gangs, has remained calm through the recent battles. Mr Von Kemedi puts this down to his state’s decision to pay the militants in order to encourage them not to steal or attack pipelines. “It’s not a very neat solution, but what are the options?” he asks.

 

 

 

Excerpt from: Nigeria: Risky Toughness, the Economist, Sept. 18, 2008 

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