Part Two of Three Parts (Please read Part One first)

      On the other hand, we could accept that N.K. has become a nuclear-armed nation. We could try to use diplomacy, sanctions, and other international pressure to prevent the growth of N.K.’s nuclear arsenal but they would still have nuclear weapons. Kim might be tempted to escalate provocations against S.K. with conventional weapons assuming that his nuclear weapons would prevent a robust response from the U.S. and S.K. militaries.

        With respect to the threat posed by N.K. missiles and warheads, we could try to rely on antimissile defenses such as the THADD antimissile system that the U.S. is in the process of deploying in S.K. However, even the deployment of antimissiles systems can have a destabilizing effect on the international situation. China has already complained about the THADD system because they are afraid that if there is a conflict in the South China Sea, the THADD system in S.K. might be able to interfere with Chinese missiles. N.K. is also threatening to hit cities in the U.S. While the U.S. does have antimissiles defense systems in place in Alaska and California, these systems have not proven to be one hundred percent effective.

        The new U.S. President has suggested that other countries such as Japan and South Korea are not paying enough for U.S. nuclear protection and that perhaps they should build their own nuclear weapons. This is a departure from the U.S. policy of preventing the proliferation of nuclear weapons by promising non-nuclear nations that the U.S. would protect them. With increasing belligerence on the part of N.K. and ambiguous signals from the U.S. with respect to existing treaties, Japan and South Korea might consider developing their own nuclear weapons programs. This would definitely concern both Russia and China and might destabilize the current balance of power in the Far East.

        It has also been suggested that the U.S. deploy nuclear weapons to S.K. This would go against the long-standing demand that the U.S. has made for a Korean Peninsula that is completely free of nuclear weapons. The U.S. already maintains conventional forces in S.K. to deter N.K. aggression and the U.S. Navy can easily stage nuclear attacks from offshore if needed. It would appear that moving U.S. nuclear weapons into S.K. would be of little use.

        Critics of the U.S. policy towards N.K. point out that the U.S. has not really brought to bear the full weight of international pressure and sanctions on N.K. Major U.S. and U.N. sanctions were just put into effect last year. N.K. is a poor country and only continues to exist with major support from China. The new U.S. President is trying to force or bribe the Chinese into exerting more pressure on N.K. to disarm. The U.S. may consider sanctions against China in order to compel them to help with N.K. On the other hand, there have been some sanctions on N.K. in the past and N.K. proved to be adaptable in circumventing many of these sanctions through the use of front companies and the covert assistance of other countries.

Please read Part Three

Artist’s concept of Kim Jong-un:

China has signed an agreement under which it will ensure the safe and secure transit of low-enriched uranium (LEU) and equipment through its territory to and from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) LEU Bank, which is being established in neighbouring Kazakhstan. World-nuclear-news.org

Japan’s continued use of nuclear power requires the public to be informed about the importance of the energy source and for its confidence in the industry to be restored, according to Japan Atomic Industrial Forum (JAIF) chairman Takashi Imai. World-nuclear-news.org

Japanese conglomerate Toshiba, owner of U.S.-based nuclear power giant Westinghouse Electric Company, released their twice-delayed financial report for the third fiscal quarter of 2016 on Tuesday, projecting losses of $9.2 billion for the year. The figures, which were not signed off on by the company’s auditor, is based on a $4.8 billion loss for the first nine months of the year, plus skyrocketing losses at Westinghouse due to that company’s Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection filing, Toshiba said. Nuclearstreet.com

Kim Jong-un SECRET WEAPON: North Korea’s hidden SUBMARINE threat amid nuclear attack plan. Express.co.uk

 

Part One of Three Parts

        U.S. Navy ships are sailing towards the Korean Peninsula. Kim Jong-un, the leader of the North Korea is threatening nuclear war if the U.S. ships make any aggressive moves. China just moved one hundred and fifty thousand troops to its border with N.K. to deal with a flood of refugees that will be inevitable if there is war on the Peninsula. Donald Trump, the new U.S. President recently tweeted that “North Korea is looking for trouble” and if China does not help, “we will solve the problem without them.” What is going on with North Korea?

        N. K. has a widespread and sophisticated nuclear research program including at least one hundred nuclear-related facilities. In the last ten years, N.K. has conducted five nuclear test detonations with the last test in 2016 in the ten to twenty kiloton range. It is estimated by nuclear experts that N.K. possesses enough fissile material to make up to fifty nuclear warheads and may be able to accumulate over a hundred warheads by 2020.

        N.K. is believed to have several hundred short and medium range ballistic missiles that could hit any part of South Korea. N.K. has a few intermediate range ballistic missiles that could reach Japan. They claim to have ICBMs that could reach the west coast of the U.S. but questions have been raised about the accuracy and reliability of these ICBMs. Kim claims to be in the final stages of preparation to test N.K. ICBMs but no one is sure how soon that will be.

        Many nuclear experts believe the claims by N.K. that they have managed to miniaturize nuclear warheads so that they could be carried by their ICBMs. However, they will also have to develop reentry vehicles that will protect the warheads when they reenter the atmosphere. There is less confidence among experts that N.K. has such reentry vehicles.

       The U.S. President and the U.S. military planners are considering different options with respect to dealing with N.K.’s march toward a sophisticated nuclear arsenal. Such options lie on a spectrum that ranges from an all out attack on N.K. to allowing N.K. to fulfill its nuclear ambitions and trying to negotiate peace with the N.K. regime.

        The U.S. could stage a preemptive strike against N.K. nuclear facilities and missiles. However, we know that N.K. has over a hundred facilities and there may be many more hidden in underground bunkers which would be difficult to destroy even if we knew where they were. We could attack fixed missile launch facilities but N.K. has mobile launchers that can be easily moved and hidden. If we did not manage to knock out all of N.K.’s nuclear capacity, they could and probably would retaliate against S.K. and millions would die.

        Even if we did neutralize their nuclear weapons, N.K. has a huge army and arsenal of conventional weapons. Seoul, S.K. has a population of twenty-five million and is only thirty-five miles from the De-Militarized Zone. N.K. artillery could easily reach Seoul from inside N.K. In addition to explosive artillery shells, they might also deploy chemical and/or biological weapons.

Please read Part Two and Part Three

Flag of North Korea: 

Toshiba, a pillar of the modern Japanese economy whose roots stretch back to the country’s industrial stirrings in the 19th century, warned on Tuesday that a disastrous foray into nuclear power may have crippled its business beyond repair. Tampabay.com

Last month during a visit to Beijing, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson raised the possibility of allowing Japan to acquire nuclear weapons in response to North Korea’s progress toward developing a nuclear weapons arsenal with ballistic missiles. Inhomelandsecurity.com

The 70-plus emergency sirens around the Artificial Island nuclear generating complex will be tested Tuesday night, officials say. The sirens located within the 10-mile radius of the three reactors operated by PSEG Nuclear, are scheduled to sound at 7:20 p.m., according to company spokesman Joe Delmar. The sirens — 34 in New Jersey and 37 in Delaware –will sound for three minutes. Nj.com

The future of Britain’s biggest nuclear power plant is again in doubt after its owner posted a mammoth loss and warned it may not be able to survive. Thisismoney.co.uk

 

       I have blogged many times about the problems involved with the disposal of nuclear waste. There are two main sources of nuclear waste. The first source is the contamination of sites in the U.S. and other countries where nuclear weapons were manufactured. The other source is the spent nuclear fuel rods that are piling up at nuclear power plants in the U.S. and abroad. Many scientists all over the world are working on issues surround nuclear waste and its disposal.

     The U.K. has about one hundred and fifty-eight billion cubic feet of nuclear waste. Most of that waste is in ponds and silos at ground level at Sellafield in Cumbria. The government intends to bury the most radioactive of this waste underground encased in concrete. It is hoped that the physical barriers and the chemistry of the barrier materials will stop any of the radioactive materials from being released for thousands of years. A site for the U.K. geological repository has not yet been chosen.

      It had been assumed that using concrete to embed the waste would result in an environment that was too alkaline for bacteria to flourish. However, Jonathan Lloyd, a geomicrobiologist at the University of Manchester, UK, presented research at the annual meeting of the Microbiology Society in Edinburgh last week that concluded that bacteria might do better than expected in the waste repository.

     Concrete has a pH of about eleven. This is the same level that is found in bleach which is routinely used as a disinfectant to kill bacteria. Lloyd and his team went to a lime kiln which has a similar pH to see if they could find bacteria that could thrive in those conditions. “We went to see if there was biology there and there was. All the sorts of organisms we were interested in studying, we could find, and we found they could grow at pH values you would probably find developing around these cementitious waste forms.”

      It turned out that the radiation level expected at the repository was also not a problem for the bacteria that Lloyd and his team found. Not only does the radioactivity not kill the bacteria, there is some evidence that it actually served to assist the bacteria in processing nutrients.

      The activity of the bacteria can also alter the radioactive compounds in the waste in ways that make them less likely to be leached out and carried away by groundwater. There is cellulose in some radioactive materials found in the waste. The alkaline conditions found in the waste can convert the cellulose into isosaccharinic acid (ISA). ISA can form a soluble compound with uranium which could make it vulnerable to ground water. The bacteria found by Lloyd removes carbon from ISA which results in keeping the radioactive materials in a solid form that will not be threatened by ground water.

       Finally, radioactive waste can generate hydrogen gas. The buildup of hydrogen gas in repositories could force open cracks to the surface above the repository which could allow radioactive gases to escape. Bacteria in the repository could reduce the level of hydrogen gas and reduce the threat.

        There is also the possibility that the bacteria studied by Lloyd and his group could be used to removed radioactive contamination from water which would be a big advance in the handling of environmental contamination.

North Korean state media warned on Tuesday of a nuclear attack on the United States at any sign of American aggression as a U.S. Navy strike group steamed toward the western Pacific. nbcnews.com

The Baden-Württemberg ministry of environment has issued German utility EnBW a permit to decommission and dismantle unit 1 of its Philippsburg nuclear power plant. Meanwhile, dismantling of unit 1 at its Neckarwestheim plant has now officially begun. World-nuclear-news.org

Australia wishes to export uranium to India “as soon as possible”, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said today. Turnbull made his comments during an official visit to India. World-nuclear-news.org

The French government has called for the closure of the Fessenheim nuclear power plant in eastern France, taking the initiative less than a week after the owner of the plant, EDF, said it would keep the plant open past the retirement of the current administration. Nuclearstreet.com