Mururoa - Almost 15 years after the last tests. Where do we stand ?

" At our stage of knowledge, two things seem to be infinite: The Universe and Human stupidity... Regarding the universe, I am not completely sure .... "

Albert Einstein

During the period 1966 to 1982 and then in 1995 France undertook a total of 172 nuclear tests in the atoll of Mururoa and Fangataufa in Polynesia. These allowed our country to produce 800 nuclear war heads. In 1995, once the last series of test were completed France together with the USA ( who had carried out nuclear tests in Marshall and Bikini islands), and the United Kingdom finally agreed to sign the treaty for a pacific nuclear free zone. The french nuclear tests and particularly the last one resulted in world wide protests. Mururoa is a small atoll located at 1200 km east/south east of Tahiti in the polynesia. Nuclear tests were first carried out in the atmosphear ( from 1966 to 1975), resulting in necessary displacement of the native population because of the contamination and then underground. It seems that the explosions have damaged the atoll's geological structure with huge cracks appearing on the coral. The land and water would also be contaminated. But...

According to a french nuclear safety agency's report published in 2007 the tests would have had limited impact on the health of the population living nearby. This nuclear safety agency belongs to the Ministry of Defence....its scientific credibility may be challenged.It is amazing to note how little independant information is available on the subject. Media self censorship effect ? What is sure is that the situation in this part of polynesia will have to be monitored for decades as the impact of these explosions has with no doubt be very detrimental on the environment with potential negative impact for many, many, MANY years to come...

Very sad indeed.

ONCE UPON A TIME.... CHERNOBYL

Chernobyl.
It was 23 years ago.
None of the 99th ISTOM promotion were born yet. But still we all know what this name stands for.
Today we want to refresh your memory as we should never forget. We should draw the lessons from history. Let us pray that this never happen again.
Once upon a time.......

On 26 April 1986 took place the most serious civil nuclear incident in history. Explosions at reactor number four of the nuclear power plant at Chernobyl in Ukraine, a Republic of the former Soviet Union at that time, created a major nuclear emergency which had an impact over countries in Europe, and especially over large areas of Belarus, the Russian Federation and Ukraine. The Chernobyl disaster was a human tragedy, resulting in displacement of populations, and the contamination of large number of people and vast areas of land.
.An estimated 350 000 clean-up workers or "liquidators" from the army, local police and fire services were involved in cleaning up the radioactive debris during the 2 years that followed the incident. Many of them died of cancer or Leukemia due to the exposure to radioactivity. Over 490 0000 people were evacuated from the area surrounding the Chernobyl reactor to non-contaminated areas. A large increase in the incidence of cancer has occurred among affected people who lived in the most contaminated areas. This was due to direct exposure to radiations but also to radioactive deposits in pastures eaten by cows who then concentrated it in their milk which was subsequently drunk by children. Chernobyl may probably have also cause an increase of cancers in western Europe beyond Belarus, the Russian Federation and Ukraine.
Chernobyl had also an impact on mental health and psychological effects on the affected population. High levels of stress, anxiety and medically unexplained physical symptoms continue to be reported among those affected directly or indirectly by the disaster. Twenty three years after the incident, many people are still under schock. It is also reported that the designation of the affected population as “victims” rather than “survivors” has led to feelings of helplessness and lack of control over their future. This has resulted in individual destructive behaviours, such as the overuse of alcohol and tobacco, or the consumption of mushrooms, berries and wild animals from areas still having high levels of radioactivity.

Dear readers, do you know how many nuclear plants we have in France ?........................

Nuclear energy or no nuclear energy ? That is the question ...

The debate about the pros and cons of nuclear energy dates back to the 60's/70's, when the first programmes for the launch of civil nuclear energy plants were launched in the developped world ( mostly Europe, The US but also in the USSR ).

The establishment of nuclear plants resulted in fierce debates amonst public opinion and politicians and major demonstrations in the world lead by the one opposed to the development of this type of energy. One could even say that these were at the origin of the development of the first "ecologist" and "green" contestation movements in Europe. Peace movements and also extreme leftist groups had also the nuclear as a common enemy, reflecting the interests of global capitalism.

Today the picture has evolved and many in the public have changed their mind with the new developments regarding on the one hand the concerns regarding the end to come of major fossile energy reserves ( oil and gas) and on the other hand the challenges of climate change due to the global warming.

Dear blog reader let us have a quick cartesian review of the matter to help us make our mind on a complex issue for which there is no simple answer.

Let us take as real life example: the case of France.

Did you know that our beloved hexagon is the 2nd world producer of nuclear energy ?

How comes ?

The facts are as follows: In the 70 's nuclear energy was covering 2% of our energy requirements and oil approximately 78 %.
Today nuclear energy covers 41 % of our requirements, oil 33% and gas 15 %, the rest being covered by hydroenergy and other renewable energies ( by the way France is also the first producer of renewable energy in Europe with wood counting for 55%, hydroenergy counting for 29 %, biofuels, 4% and solar + wind sadly representing only a bare 1% of total renewable energies). When came the first energy crisis in the 70's with the first time major increase of oil, the government decided to launch a major program of building of nuclear plants and the result is that today we have 58 nuclear plants scattered every where on our territory ( look at the map and try to find a place where to live if you are allergic to the vicinity of nuclear plants... you will not find it easy...).

From an economic and strategic point of view the political decision makers realized that France being one of the world major economy, (currently being the 7th bigger consumer of energy in the world) owns very limited fossile energy reserves. In fact, it is considered that France would own only 0.01% of fossile energy reserves of the world with little coal production left ( production decreased from 40 million metric tons per year in the 70's to less than 3 million metric tons in the years 2000), and very limited and decreasing gas reserves ( national gas production decreased from 15% of need in the 70's to less than 2% today). To ensure the energetic independance of the nation, the choice of nuclear energey appeared as THE solution and in fact today, thanks to this choice our country is independant for over 50% of its energy requirements and even generates major revenues from sale of electricity to european neighbours. The production of nuclear energy may also help the country meet the internationally agreed goals of 4 times reduction of CO2 gas emissions by 2050 and thus contribute significantly to reduction of global warming. Finally France has gained over the past almost 40 years a considerable "know how" in terms of nuclear technology and is now in a position to export it to many countries in the world that have indicated their interest to equip themselves with this new technology.

Let us review briefly the pros and cons of Nuclear energy:

The " pros"

- Energetic independance
- Technology of the future
- Alternative to decreasing world fossile resources
- Very limited impact on global warming
- Good source of export revenues

The "cons"

- Sophisticated Technology with major environmental risks and impact on human health ( remember Chernobyl) for a very long period of time.
- Problems of storage of residues

The next question may be: Do we have the choice or alternatives ?

The answer could be: yes we should definitely invest more in the research and development of other sources of energy; for the short term there is a lot of potential in developping more the use of non renewable energies such as the solar, the wind, the waves, the biofuels; for the long term to invest massively in the research on nuclear fusion ( the problem of energy would be resolved for ever... we can always dream...). We should also invest more on new modes of energy saving.

BUT for the very short term let us be realistic, we may not have other choice than to continue to rely on nuclear civil energy, particularly with current patterns of consumption and economic development. Should we decide to review the way our society is consuming,.... then it is another story..

We realize that this approach may not be very popular and we are looking forward to receive your views on the matter !

NUCLEAR EMERGENCY. WHAT FARMERS SHOULD DO TO MINIMIZE THE DAMAGES TO HUMAN HEALTH

Twenty years after, the name of Chernobyl reminds us of the terrible impact of the first major nuclear incident after the second world war. The major developped countries, particularly in Europe, but also the United Nations are working on a project to prepare for such an eventuality of nuclear disaster and how to minimize the impact of it. Here are some advices for the prevention of radioactive contamination of agricultural foodstuffs. In case of a declared nuclear emergency, the following measures should be taken immediately by farmers . We found interresting to show this measures, because released at the agriculture and so could concerned the our courses.


Protect growing vegetables and animal fodder - cover with plastic sheets
Bring livestock in from pasture - move animals into a shed or barn;
Harvest any ripe crops and place under cover.
Do not consume locally produced milk or vegetables;
Do not process or distribute food products;
Do not fish, hunt or gather mushrooms or other forest foods.
Prevent the ingestion of contaminated herbage by grazing animals;
Prohibit hunting, fishing, mushroom collection, and consumption of vegetables and water derived from precipitations.
In potentially contaminated areas:
Do not use water for irrigation;
Do not burn vegetation or any material stored outdoors, including firewood.


The above measures may seem very simple, but do not forget that one of the major cause of contamination is due to the food ingested. It is important to control as soon as possible the risks of contamination at the level of food production. With this regard, it is reported that a large number of cancers would have been avoided after Chernobyl if the consumption of milk had been stopped immediately after he incident, which was not the case......
Future agrodeveloppers of ISTOM be aware and be prepared !

(source : these measures have been found in the website of the United Nations, http://www.fao.org/ )

Dirty bomb ? What is this. Did you ever hear about a clean bomb any way?

are you interested to know what is a “dirty bomb”?

A dirty bomb, or radiological dispersion device, is a bomb that combines conventional
explosives, such as dynamite, with radioactive materials in the form of powder. The idea behind a dirty bomb is to spread radioactive material into some populated area. This could contaminate buildings and the local environment, and expose people to radiation. Persons could be externally (skin) contaminated or internally contaminated …The main purpose of a dirty bomb is to frighten people by contaminating their environment with radioactive materials and threatening large numbers of people with
exposure. Such use of radiation is only hypothetical and has not been used by terrorists
before, but the possibility exists…. Dirty bombs are designed to spread fear and panic.

Dirty bomb vs atomic bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki

The atomic bomb explosions in Hiroshima and Nagasaki were nuclear weapons
involving a fission reaction.It caused severe harm,the death of hundreds of thousand of people and contamination of large areas. By contrast, a dirty bomb is not an atomic explosion,
it can only spread radioactive material and contaminate a relatively small area. Dirty
bombs are not weapons of mass destruction.

Their effect is expected to be very much less than of a
nuclear bomb (but still let us crossfingers)

The nuclear today

RED:Five "nuclear weapons states" from the NPT (USA, Russia, UK, France, China)

DARK YELLOW:Other known nuclear powers (India, Pakistan, North Korea)

LIGHT YELLOW: States suspected of having possession of, or suspected of being in the process of developing, nuclear weapons (Israel, Iran, Ukraine)

PINK: States which at one point had nuclear weapons and/or nuclear weapons research programs (Argentina, Brazil, Egypt, Germany, Iraq, Japan, Libya, Poland, Romania, South Africa, South Korea, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan).

the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (1970)

The objective of the treaty is to limit at most the number of the nuclear powers, by “forbidding any State endowed with nuclear weapons to transfer nuclear weapons or other explosive nuclear device and to help, neither to encourage, nor to incite in no way a State not endowed with nuclear weapons to make it or to acquire it. Besides, any State not endowed with nuclear weapons makes a commitment to accept of whoever it is the transfer of nuclear weapons and not to make them nor to acquire them. “

Major powers, which base their safety on them nuclear weapons and which continue to modernize their arsenal, have they the right to oppose that the other countries want to follow their example? These countries, besides weaker, do not they have too the right for the deterrence? There is an intellectual contradiction concerning the TNP, to allow making what we forbid to the others.

Furthermore, certain countries did not sign this treaty. Its rules do not thus apply to them. They are not official, but unofficial nuclear powers, and did not thus violate the international law by being equipped with an atomic arsenal