Ukraine

Uranium Could Have Made Dirty Bomb

Friday, December 7, 2007

BRATISLAVA, Slovakia (AP) — Two Hungarians and a Ukrainian arrested in an attempted sale of uranium were peddling material believed to be from the former Soviet Union, and it was enriched enough to be used in a radiological "dirty bomb," police said Thursday.

The three, who were arrested Wednesday in eastern Slovakia and Hungary, were trying to sell about a pound of uranium in powder form, said First Police Vice President Michal Kopcik.

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Atomstroyexport in talks to build nuclear plant in Belarus

Wednesday, November 28, 2007

MOSCOW, November 26 (RIA Novosti) - Atomstroyexport, Russia's nuclear power equipment and service export monopoly, has begun talks on building a nuclear power plant in Belarus, the company's first vice president said on Monday.

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko announced in October that his country would build a nuclear plant to ensure energy security.

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U.N. to promote self-reliance in Chernobyl area

Wednesday, November 21, 2007

By Edith Honan, Reuters

NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.N. efforts to help people affected by the Chernobyl nuclear disaster two decades ago should focus on rebuilding self-reliance instead of treating them as victims, a U.N. official said on Monday.

The U.N. General Assembly is expected to pass a resolution on Tuesday saying U.N. activity in the region must move beyond humanitarian assistance in favor of a focus on development.

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Anti-nuclear activists demonstrate discreetly in front of WHO

Friday, November 16, 2007

Le Monde, 26 September 2007

You could easily miss them. But for five months now, every day, two or three people, with posters around their necks, stand at an intersection in Geneva, from 10.00 until 18.00, Monday to Friday, facing the World Health Organization, and distributing to passers-by a dossier entitled Health Catastrophe of Chernobyl: WHO guilty of non assistance to populations in danger”.

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Russia to supply 7 kg of nuclear fuel for Ukraine test reactor

Monday, November 5, 2007

MOSCOW, November 1 (RIA Novosti) - Russian state-run nuclear fuel producer TVEL will supply 7 kilograms of low enriched uranium to a research reactor in Ukraine in 2008, the company announced on Thursday.

The nuclear fuel will be delivered under a Russian-U.S. program, Reduced Enrichment for Research and Test Reactors (RERTR), aimed at developing technical methods to convert reactors from the use of highly-enriched uranium (HEU), which can be used in atom bombs, to low enriched uranium (LEU).

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Belarus to hold tender in 2008 to build nuclear power plant

Friday, October 19, 2007

MINSK, October 19 (RIA Novosti) - Belarus will hold a tender next year for a project to build its first nuclear power plant, at which Russian and Western partners are expected to bid, the prime minister said on Friday.

The Belarusian leadership has said the country needs the plant to ensure national energy security amid rising hydrocarbon prices. Russia doubled its gas price for Belarus at the start of the year, after over a decade of heavily discounted prices. The new plant is expected to provide 15% of the country's power consumption.

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Belarus to 'build nuclear plant'

Thursday, October 11, 2007

Belarussian President Alexander Lukashenko says his country needs to build a nuclear power station. The creation of a domestic nuclear energy source was essential to guarantee "national security", Interfax news quoted Mr Lukashenko as saying.

Work on the reactor would start in 2008, he said. It is expected to be ready in four to eight years.

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Chernobyl to be covered in steel

Tuesday, September 18, 2007

The authorities in Ukraine have approved a giant steel cover for the radioactive site of the world's worst nuclear disaster - Chernobyl.

The existing shelter was hastily constructed after the accident

The existing shelter was hastily constructed after the accident
Ukraine has hired a French firm to build the structure to replace the crumbling concrete casing put over the reactor after the 1986 accident.

The casing project is expected to cost $1.4bn (£700m).

It will take five years to complete and the authorities say they will then be able to start dismantling the reactor.

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French-led consortium to build new shelter for Chernobyl's exploded reactor

Monday, September 3, 2007

PARIS A French-led consortium will build a new shelter to encase the reactor at Ukraine's Chernobyl power station that exploded in 1986 in history's worst nuclear accident.

The new shelter will enclose the existing concrete "sarcophagus" erected hastily after the 1986 accident, which has been crumbling and leaking radiation for more than a decade.

The contract for the Novarka consortium, including Bouygues SA and Vinci SA, will be worth more than €430 million (US$593.14 million), Vinci said in a statement Tuesday night.

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Nuclear sector hopes CO2 will lift Chernobyl curse

Monday, June 18, 2007

EUOBSERVER / CLIMATE TECHNOLOGY - For the millions of Europeans who mistrust nuclear power, it may cause goose-pimples to think that at least six new plants will soon join the 152 reactors already fizzing away on EU soil. But despite fresh talk of how nuclear can cut CO2, the industry is still struggling to get over the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.

A visitor to a typical reactor could be convinced the atom is a magic key to the EU's energy woes: standing on the core, just 10 metres under one's feet, splitting uranium atoms generate enough power (1,100 MW) to light up all the homes in Finland for a year. There is no sound. There is no smell. As you leave, a scanning machine says "You have not been contaminated."

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