Back to life.

Whoooah there… that was a fairly epic hiatus. My sincere apologies lads and lasses, though I do (for once) have a pretty good excuse- only just had my right hand free of an utterly odorous purple cast after a bike/car collision last month. Safe to say I came out a tad worse. So typing was completely frustrating.

I did manage to get down to the G20 protests though, still scabby and aching from the crash… not much I can say that hasn’t been said already. Yes the police were totally out for a scrap, as were a number of tanked up city boys, but when left to its own accord the protest was breathtaking in its joyfulness and scale.

Press coverage was typically terrible; I got particularly narked with a few columnists at The Guardian, who seemed compelled to complain about how fragmented and unfocused the protest was.

This interested me, as I managed to get to both the very focused CND / Stop The War march and the more organic Bank / Climate Camp actions.

Firstly the age ranges we’re obvious, it seems to me that younger activists are less inclined to channel all their energy into one specific campaign, instead opting for newer, more open and less ideologically and hierarchically structured protest movements. But without the generic placards, spokespeople and famous faces on large platforms the press uniformly opted for a ‘look at this hilarious rabble’ approach.

Tabloids found themselves wrestling between who was worse- Greedy Bankers or Unruly Anarchists (that may even be European?!), broadsheets lamented for the days when it was assumed that everyone at a protest was there for the same reason.

Well personally, I thought the melee of actions, ideas and people who attended London that day was wholly positive.

Both the G20 Meltdown and Climate Camp groups showed a serious ability to organise, get things done, deal with nonchalant media and resist abusive riot police, all whilst smack bang in the middle of Central London, with the whole world watching.

Best mention how nice it was to have some faith reaffirmed in The Guardian (as paper de jour of my middle class household!) after their very important campaign on the behalf of Ian Tomlinson and police accountability.

So there’s been a hella lotta news on the nuclear front, as always…

Big two would have to be Obama’s continuing pledge to rid the world of nuclear weapons (see last article for some cynical analysis of that!)

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/apr/01/nuclear-disarmament-barack-obama-dmitri-medvedev

So now its about campaigning to uphold and extend these promises, especially in Britain –

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/7948367.stm

That speech gives a good overview of what we’re up against.

Brown spins the usual rhetoric about civil power for all, weapons for a few, ‘multilateral control of the fuel cycle’ that will of course be ‘lead’ by the UK. Calls for ‘monitoring of abuses of the Non Proliferation Treaty’ without mentioning our own, all underpinned with a belief that reducing ‘nuclear materials’ should never mean reducing civil nuclear power (quite the opposite!) or our own ‘effective deterrence’.

There is also a mention of Sellafield –

‘Since 2003 in the UK we have spent more than £70 million on improving security at our Sellafield site alone - and we are committed to spending a further £220 million on the construction of a state of the art storage facility.’

Which was the other big story this month.

It’s more expensive!

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/nuclear-cleanup-bill-16312bn-higher-than-predicted-775603.html

More toxic!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/apr/19/sellafield-nuclear-plant-cumbria-hazards

And yet, less criticised.

This is our so called saviour right here, ten of these in 30 years, crumbling into a glowing, fatal, costly black hole.

Sellafield should be seen as a huge crystal ball. It’s sat there right now, silently screaming “look what happens when you give the nuclear industry the keys, the funds, the freedom to ‘solve’ problems of the future”.

Yet here we go again.

And as for the earlier argument-

More nuclear power stations = less proliferation ?

I was never very good at maths, but you don’t need to be a physicist to see how that equation will never add up…

Next time-

Less news digesting, more action updates and music.

There’s a lot happening in the next few months that we should all be aware of.

Gordon trims his fingernails.

Roundup!
YO.
My apologies for lacking regularity. It’s been a rather busy week. Busy in terms of nuclear news too, so let’s have a little look over.

In terms of weapons-

Gordon Brown has made a distinct commitment to participation in multilateral disarmament talks.
Perhaps a slow clap is in order?
I realise how petty it may seem to quickly dismantle this potentially positive declaration, a fact New Labour have used to undermine their radical factions for years, but tiny piecemeal and tokenistic gestures must be treated as such.
Yes, yes, yes, any move towards disarmament is a good one. Well done Brown, a few less marbles for your catapult and the other kids might follow suit… let’s be clear here, Gordon is talking about reducing the number of missiles per submarine to 12, as apposed to 16, and each missile can carry multiple warheads with around 8 times the explosive capacity of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima.

Not quite laying down your arms then guys, more just trimming your fingernails.

But I am genuinely glad that its being talked about… as opposed to the dismayingly undemocratic way Blair handled Trident renewal (No Green Paper consultation, false claims of ‘Nothing is ruled in or out’ followed by a detailed White Paper days after, no official parliamentary debate, let alone a public one) hopefully Brown’s statement at least means there’s a chance for discussion.

So why now?
Well perversely, the whole ‘America’s poodle’ insult seems to working in our favour this time, clearly Barack’s commitment to reduction of America’s nuclear arsenal is helping.
Obama has been consistent in a way that makes me genuinely hopeful-
Through the election-
http://edition.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/07/16/obama.speech/
To office-
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1873887,00.html
Though as that article will tell you: he faces considerable struggle from the Pentagon, particularly his own defence secretary Robert Gates, who has remained in the post since 2006. Gates has a masters in Soviet history and has masterfully over-emphasised the Soviet threat throughout the last two decades. He also embroiled at the CIA in the Iran-Contra affair http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran-Contra_Affair , when weapons were sold for hostages to a few powerful Iranians (It would be interesting to see where they all ended up!). He is committed to a large American nuclear deterrent, but I guess they make you tattoo that to your eyelids when you join the pentagon team.
Also- it’s worth noting that during the presidential nomination campaign Hillary Clinton took a slightly different line on nuclear weapons to Obama…
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/02/AR2007080202288.html
Namely that unlike Obama, she would not rule out the use of nuclear weapons against terrorists in the middle east, a blatantly ridiculous idea considering the potential for civilian death, international disgust, full blown nuclear war and complete lack of success (if we can’t find them on the ground, what good would a nuclear attack do?!).
Clinton is of course now Secretary of State, with all the foreign affairs responsibilities that brings.
They may just be two potentially pro-nuclear US policy-makers, but they are a very powerful two, and there are more. My point being that we should not assume American nuclear disarmament, and the domino affect it has on the rest of the world, is now a closed case.
We need to keep fighting for more, keep pushing for serious steps towards an end to the nuclear age.

Clearly America and Britain want to see this gesture catch on in Moscow, and crucially Iran, Pakistan and India.
But what none of them have managed to do is link a reduction in Nuclear Power to a reduction in Nuclear Weapons, quite the opposite.
The crucial, disastrous, clause in the Nuclear Proliferation Treaty is one of expanding Civil Nuclear Power; particularly that the big nuclear states will not help develop Nuclear Power unless a country adheres to the NPT. This has undoubtedly led to a spread of nuclear materials across the world, becoming even more dangerous when, in 2006, the Bush administration agreed to help fund India’s civil nuclear power program, despite them being one of three countries which refused to sign the NPT.

So as much as it is trumpeted, the NPT is actually fuelling the spread of nuclear materials, and since 2006, has left developing nuclear states with no reason to not develop weapons as well as power.
What will Obama do about that?!

Brown’s speech made clear the link between the two branches of Nuclear Power, but still painted a picture of ‘Atoms for peace’ spreading their gleeful way across the globe, with western nuclear weapon’s states in complete control of technology and fuel. If nuclear power is so separate from nuclear weapons then why won’t the NPT elite relinquish their grip of civil technology?
Because deep down they know that a rise in civil nuclear technology will undoubtedly lead to a rise in nuclear weapons.

So the mood at the moment is one of renewed commitment, ahead of the 2010 NPT talks, to international nuclear disarmament. Brilliant! Let’s seize that. Clearly political and financial circumstance has meant that western powers see now as a good time for a slight reduction in our arsenal.
http://www.cnduk.org/index.php/press-releases/trident/trident-replacement-costs-grow-delivery-date-may-slip-us-missiles-may-not-fit-say-mps.html
Stories like that can make you see why.
People don’t want to see their money wasted on utterly abhorrent ‘deterrents’.
The challenge now is to show the inextricable link between power and weapons, to show how money on civil nuclear ‘solutions’ is wasted too.
Withdrawn investments and lack of government backing are having a hard effect on renewable technologies, whilst Brown sets himself up as a ‘wise purveyor’ of nuclear ‘sense’ – less weapons, more power (an impossible equation) - It’s up to us, the anti-nuclear lobby, to make sure people realise that all nuclear technology is toxic, corporate and disastrous for both people and planet.

A few bits and bobs.

Just a quick one now, after last times slight marathon.

A fair few people have got in touch with things for me to mention and bits of advice/praise (mainly the former... :D)


http://www.newenergyfocus.com/do/ecco.py/view_item?listid=1&listcatid=32&listitemid=2311

Thanks to Dorothy Skrytek for sending me that link.
It basically sums up the argument I was trying to make in my last post- but with less self concious 'funny bits' and more beardly wisdom.
Maybe I should grow a beard?

http://hes.decc.gov.uk/bloggers_toolkit

'Heat and Energy Saving Strategy Consultation'

Came from Jake Wittlin.
TA!
'Government initiaves on Climate Change- can they ever be of any worth?' There's a dissitation waiting to happen. The Anarchist in me sees local responsibility and accountability as paramount to tackling this bugger, yet someone needs to try and get the big polluters in check... I'm just doubtful to whether the Department for Energy and Climate Change can do that...
So will the preaching of everyones second favourite Miliband (the Luigi to Dave's Mario) really make a difference? Who knows...
I'm not one of those people that recoil from any kind of governance or authority, I just know the track record of the DECC- bending to the wills of everyone from the Nuclear Lobby to Peter Mandleson.
But yeh, at least its there, hopefully it will prove more than tokenistic.

Finally- Lozza Natilli contacted me with a link to this crazy thing-
http://www.isotopiafestival.org/
The 'Only anti-nuclear festival in the world'
So thats one for all my Australian readers... (there must be litterally tens...)
The poster alone makes feel slightly inebriated.
I can only imagine what the festival itself would do to me. Looks fun though!


Lastly, importantly...
ACTION UPDATE!

There's some fun stuff going down regarding anti-BAE action up in Northern England in the not-too-distant future.
BAE make a whole lot of nasty shit.... from a nuclear perspective these are the guys building the new generation of trident submarines (though they're quick to point out that they don't build the warheads)
They also have supplied nuke-ready bombers to India from Britain, and Pakistan from America- seemingly content at stoking the fires to one of the most volatile disputes in the world, and a real possibility for nuclear warfare.

email me securely at zna@riseup.net
for info on the next anti-BAE meeting... Can't really say more here: after all, these we're the guys that paid someone £25000 a month to spy on Campaign Against The Arms Trade... they probably employ someone to just repeatedly type 'anti-BAE' into google and note down any pesky morals which permeate onto the internet.

Also here's a rather humungous tune I nicked off the fabulous neonized blog, hopefully they wont mind.
http://neonized.net

It's almost relevent because in the next few months you will all be seeing the onsett of a Zombie Apocalypse.
Orchestrated by the glorious Zombies for a Nuclear Apocalypse, of which I am a member.
Watch this space.
and listen to this tune with a sense of impeding doom.
Zomby- Tears in the rain

Turning tides?

Time to get serious.

So nuclear is in the news! Hoorah!
It’s good to see the issues out in public domain again, particularly as the Government has seemed so keen to push its pro-nuke agenda without fair consultation or debate.
It took me about 4 hours yesterday to trawl through the stuff surrounding this one news story, so I’ll try be a bit briefer in summing up my own stance.

It all started in The Independent.
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/green-living/nuclear-power-yes-please-1629327.html

Would it be wrong to make a joke about taking ‘Green Living’ a little too literally?
Probably.

The article caused such a stir because four of the ‘country’s leading environmentalists’ have come out in favour of nuclear power.
I’ll do a post specifically about the four guys, and others that have crossed over, soon, for now though here’s some summation and analysis. Deep Breath!
The fact that it’s being classed as front page material simply because these guys have done a U-turn seems a bit odd, as the paper acknowledged afterwards –

“Is it a big deal that the Green have changed?
Yes and no. Symbolically it is hugely important. Plans for new reactors are still expected to raise hackles but the Green movement’s acknowledgement of nuclear as the lesser of two evils will take away some of the sting. Ironically, it is the environmental agenda that made the economics of commercial nuclear expansion work.”

This little paragraph speaks volumes.
Firstly, please don’t equate these four to an entire movement; there are loads of people who have examined the facts and feel that nuclear is no more required than it ever was, probably even less. And in a pedantic sense, who the fuck is ‘the Green’… and what are ‘hackles’? You’d hope for a slighter higher degree of journalism when questioning issues as complicated as nuclear power.

Now, as Alanis Morisette failed to teach us, irony is a strange beast-

‘Like rain on your wedding day?’

That’s not irony guys! It’s just a damn shame.
So is the fact that four men can spend there lives trying to convince people about the dangers of global warming, staring at C02 figures that fill them with such fear, such desperation, that they feel propelled to a middle ground of doing something, anything, in order to see some kind of change.

Economics is essentially the study of confidence and fear- as we enter a period of fear after 10 years of confidence; people are more malleable to change. And so the environmental movement’s biggest weakness becomes clear-
We’ve distilled a fear of global warming, without sufficiently offering hopeful alternatives… I mean how much of ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ was about the future?
So there is fear- environmental and economic.
Nuclear science deals in the ‘future’, it sells itself as hope, clearly these four bought into that.

‘A free ride when you’re already late?’

Strangely, this other nugget of Morrisette explains pretty well how the four environmentalists are selling nuclear.
Essentially their main argument seems to be that Britain should be including nuclear power in plans for our future, along with renewables.
At first this seems almost reasonable. Diversity can only be a good thing right?
Well, perhaps not.
These guys know all too well that this has not been a level playing field.
Nuclear power has had such huge swathes of funding over the years, completely dwarfing money put into renewables. It aint free, that’s for sure. There is also no doubt that the two are competing for a similar sector, that for most of the big businesses it’s a choice between them, rather than investment in both, which with money stretched would no doubt equate to less energy per £ of research and development. So why should we continue to believe in something that can only provide 4% emission cuts by 2025, and in no way deal with the 85% of fossil fuel usage which is NOT energy based. Why should we let these companies and politicians sideline renewables into nothing more than a nice photo on a website, a token gesture?
Well, it seems to me that we shouldn’t.

Nuclear will not solve climate change.

Yet this is the argument these guys have found themselves behind, whether purposely or not.

Beyond that, I’d argue that nuclear can’t even compete regardless of our warming atmosphere. Put simply, the economics of commercial nuclear expansion have never worked and will never work.
The current EPR (European Pressurised Reactor) model being built in Finland is at least £1 Billion over budget and around 3 years behind schedule- Areva, the designers of the EPR, have seen a loss in profit of over 20% due to the plant in Finland.
Meanwhile EDF announced a 20% increase in costs for its third generation EPRs at Flamanville, France. The company is pushing flat out to have this flagship reactor online by 2012, so the increase reflects higher investment after the ASN (French Nuclear Safety Authority) temporarily shut the site down last year, after just 6 months building, due to safety worries.
These are the companies, the French-state backed companies, which will be building our new generation of nuclear power plants.

Our last build in Britain came ten years ago after Margaret Thatcher outlined a similarly pro-nuke plan to Brown’s; for 10 new plants. Of course only one was built, at twice the estimated cost.
If (as is so often woefully, falsely, portrayed) the argument here is Coal VS Nuclear, you’d expect Thatcher of all people to plough on into a nuclear dawn! But it didn’t make economic sense, the costs were too high, the delivery of results too late.

Yet, as The Independent states- ‘Symbolically’ coming out in favour of nuclear power looks decisive, never mind if such statements never reach fruition.

If you can name me one nuclear power build in the history of the planet that hasn’t gone over budget or over deadline I’ll be mightily impressed.
They always have, they still are, they always will.

Things haven’t changed.

Proliferation of weapons, huge decommissioning and construction costs, unfair tax-payer subsidies, potential accidents, uranium mining, transportation, terrorism, cancer…

these are the eternal problems of nuclear power.
Nuclear had its chance, renewables deserve a real one.

To let fear over global warming transport us all into a catastrophic reliance on both uranium and oil would be a massive mistake.
To miss this opportunity to put our faith in tested, diverse means of renewable energy, rather than another generation of generators which do not live up to their hyperbole but do swallow enormous amounts of much needed cash, would be to undermine decades of hard work by the environmental movement.

The future doesn’t have to be nuclear and there are still plenty of environmentalists who stand by this, not out of dogmatic ‘faith’, but out of hope in far cleaner, local, accountable and renewable energy.

D:Ream's on the Horizon.

'You can walk my path
You can wear my shoes
Let her talk like me
And be an angel too
But maybe You ain't never gonna feel this way
You ain't never gonna know me
But I know you...
Teach you now that
Things can only get better
Can only get, can only get
They get on from here
You know, I know that

Things can only get better'

D:Ream- Things can only get better.

‘The dream of a short-cut to clean unlimited energy forever must remain just that, a dream.’

-BBC2 Horizon program outro.

SO! One post down and I havnt been snaffled by a wave of angry physicists just yet...

come on guys?! I expected a far swifter onslaught of 'HARD COLD FACTS' from people with 'DECADES OF EXPERIENCE IN THE NUCLEAR SECTOR' (I.e 19 year old undergraduates who enjoy copy-pasting yesterday's AWESOME lecture over the internet and don't watch 'The Simpsons' because IT'S TOO CHUFFIN BIASED).

I realise there are some nice people involved in nuclear science though, like cuddly Brian Cox, who spent an hour last week on BBC2 wandering around various restricted nuclear sites looking- one part HUNK, forty parts exuberant child in an atomic ball pool.

Seriously- why do TV scientists think that the more they behave like children on a sugar rush the more that we, the lowly public, will buy their bullshit?

To be fair, Coxy did explain the science of fusion pretty well, and spent his first 15 minutes basically having an aural wank over 'our glorious sun' which did make one feel rather fuzzy with awe.

Only to say that... no... we shouldnt be harnessing this incredible power... we should be creating it!

I was so pissed off at the whole thing that I wrote a ridiculously long letter to the Guardian which they didnt print... the fuckers. Can anyone smell a CONSPIRACY? Jokes... The Guardian are about the only mainstream paper not firmly fellating the cold green rod of the nuclear power lobby...

here it is anyway, its a bit less reliant on crass sex references and CAPITAL LETTERS than my usual output. I've inserted some actions for you to follow at home.

'Monday night’s Horizon programme, with its ‘Top Gear’ style camera shots and boy-band physicist, Brian Cox, was a depressingly biased plea for a ‘Manhattan Project’ style drive for fusion power. APPLAUSE. This follows Horizon’s investigation into Rusi Taleyarkhan’s BOO claims that collapsing bubbles could be harnessed for power, an hour long celebration of fusion, similar to Cox’s, which then spent the last five minutes of broadcast proving the results as a scam (last year Taleyarkhan was charged with two counts of misconduct). If the BBC wishes to put fantasy on at primetime, I suggest they stick to DR Who. RAUCUS LAUGHTER Neither program gave any voice to the sizeable number of scientists who believe fusion will take more than 30 years, offering no solution to imminent climate chaos, let alone those who say it will never work. Nor did they compare the billions of pounds spent on this scientific wet dream compared to proven renewable technologies. MURMURS OF AGREEMENT The USA alone has spent around $20 Billion on Fusion, as it did on the bomb, and where has that got it in the past 50 years? I would like to make it clear that while we might not be bending the ears’ of the BBC science team, there are a growing number of young people who are determined to not let false promises of ‘free, limitless energy’ take precedence as they have done in the past. And that while HMS Vanguard and Le Triomphant seemingly attempt their own callous ‘fusion’ in the middle of the Atlantic ocean, we are very aware of the serious dangers posed by Nuclear technology. Cox’s past life as a keyboard player with D:Ream, whose biggest hit ‘Things Can Only Get Better’ became a New Labour anthem, seems to have tarnished him with an overt optimism in science’s biggest ‘If’. There are plenty of young people in Britain who realise that we need to choose scientific solutions due to their applicable effect, not their exciting nature or potential for esteem. Cox’s song and its ethos are a symbol of the past. We have to adapt, and propaganda like this program only serve to blind us from the reality. There is no ‘get out of jail free card’ Brian, and science like this is what incarcerated us in the first place. We won’t let it happen again.

STANDING OVATION'



So yeh, you can sit back down now... and enjoy some videos.

You can watch the program yourself on the BBCI player and make your own judgement-

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00hr6bk/Horizon_20082009_Can_We_Make_a_Star_on_Earth/

Here's a great video from Greenpeace that shows the other side of the argument-

http://www.greenpeace.org.uk/blog/climate/the-convenient-solution-20070718

and here's the one you've been waiting for...

I've started so I'll finish.

"the one true resolve of the flame and the bullet is a pile of flesh like an unmanned puppet;
a set of bones gone suddenly still.
and in a lab under every flag right now,
someone's splitting atoms,
and inventing new breakfast cereals in the shape of their nation's borders and drawing brand new maps, discreetly expanding their nation's borders.

it's root root root for the home team.
shout like your dad at the tv screen.
tie a dollar bill around a circus flea,
the fee to flee what you can't see.
(yo, i agree with glee with me).

somebody told me when the bomb hits everybody in a two mile radius will be instantly sublimated,
but if you lay face down on the ground for some time,
avoiding the residual ripples of heat,
you might survive,
permanently fucked up and twisted like you're always underwater refracted.
oh but if you do go gas,
there's nothing you can do if the air that was once you is mingled and mashed with the kicked up molecules of the enemy's former body.
big-kid-tested, motherfucker approved. "

-Hymie's Basement - 21st Century Pop Song

Hi.
I'm Joel.
This is a blog I've decided to create.
That song does a very good job of summing up the indignation that bubbles through my stomach whenever I think of the fantastical flirtations with disaster being perpetrated in the name of 'science' all over the world right now.

I'm not going to spend ages dryly discussing the physics behind nuclear technology.
I wouldnt want to bore you.

I am however going to try do my best to keep an up to date overview of developments within the worlds of nuclear power and weapons, offering my opinions as a young (well... 19) person who will have to inherit these fucking atrocious legacies.

It seems that now is a very good time indeed to start caring about nuclear weapons and power- both are being renewed without democratic consultation by a government which colludes callously with the nuclear lobby- a strange, huge, dangerous entity which for so long seemed dormant.

I feel it's important to show that there are a new generation of anti-nuclear campaigners forming right now, determined not to repeat the mistakes of the past and to build on the achievements of people like CND, The Druridge Bay Campaign and Trident Ploughshares.

BUT ANYWHO, It won't all be that serious. Honest.
There's hillarity lurking in the depths of nuclear politics- in the dodgy deals and hillarious direct actions, in the Sellafield seaguls with radioactive shit and the weird 'environmentalists' who want to bury plutonium in their gardens.
Plus, I'll try get some friends in to write things too... whilst throwing music in every so often too,
Speaking of which-

Here's a exuberant 'slice' of brass band crunk from a sweet free mix I got off http://www.modiba.net/ which sounds like Zach De La Rocha (but better) literally spitting with rage over some antibalas...

I wish my school brass band had sounded like this... rather than an the Wizard of Oz tinman with flatulence and asthma.

Youngblood Brass Band- Nuclear Summer
Right click save as tecnophobes!
SEE- caring is FUNKY.

up and atom kids,
x
(I promise to never use that phrase, or the word funky ever again- thought I should get them out of the way early... but realised there is no HTML which translates irony... i?!)