By Henry Chu (LA Times)

By Andrew Porter & Louise Gray (Sott.Net)

By Yan (ChinaView.cn)

By Hector IGBIKIOWUBO (Vanguard)

In 1968, $5.00 got you a full tank of gas, a pack of smokes, and a six pack of bud. In 2009, $5.00 gets you a gallon of gas, no smoke, and no beer. What happened? J.F. Kennedy’s war in Vietnams’ cost inflated the value of the U.S. dollar. The working man pays the bankers play. The wax protestors stopped the insanity. The war in Iraq has no draftees; thus no active anti war movement. Instead there is black-water the paid killers. All vary carefully engineered by Henry Kissinger and the Jews in Israel, $8,000 U.S. boys died in Vietnam, Henry Kissingers dissmiss the effort, he says don’t worry be happy. Those that died were only poor people who didn’t matter. How many troops has Israel send to the U.S. lead coalition in Iraq? ZERO, Let others die, for the Jews. Just what do you think the U.S. dollar will be worth, after going down this ill conceived road?

Iran Proposes Control System Aimed at Eliminating Nuclear Weapons
By Thomas Erdbrink

September 11, 2009
TEHRAN,

Iran is not prepared to discuss halting its uranium enrichment program in response to Western demands but is proposing instead a worldwide control system aimed at eliminating nuclear weapons, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s top political aide said in an interview Thursday.

The Web site ProPublica obtained a copy of the set of proposals handed to the permanent members of the U.N. Security Council and Germany on Wednesday, in which Iran also offered cooperation in solving problems in Afghanistan and fighting terrorism, as well as collaboration on oil and gas projects, Mojtaba Samareh Hashemi said. A longtime confidant of Ahmadinejad, Samareh Hashemi is considered the president’s closest aide and is reportedly under consideration for appointment as first vice president, a key post in Ahmadinejad’s new government.

As described by Samareh Hashemi, Iran’s offer is similar to a call by President Obama in April to eliminate the world’s nuclear weapons. At the upcoming United Nations General Assembly meeting later this month, Obama is scheduled to chair a special U.N. session aimed at seeking broad consensus on preventing the spread of nuclear weapons rather than on targeting individual nations such as Iran and North Korea. Ahmadinejad is also scheduled to attend the U.N. meeting and has said he is ready to debate Obama in front of the world media.

“It’s not really responsive to our greatest concern, which is obviously Iran’s nuclear program,” State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said of Tehran’s package of proposals. “Iran reiterated its view that as far as it is concerned, its nuclear file is closed. . . . That is certainly not the case. There are many outstanding issues.”

But Crowley did not shut the door completely. He said the United States was consulting with its other negotiating partners: Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany. “We’ll be looking to see how ready Iran is to actually engage, and we will be testing that willingness to engage in the next few weeks,” he said.

France said Thursday it is studying the proposals along with the other P5-plus-one members. Russia said it hopes negotiations with Iran will resume in the near future.

The negotiating group, known as the P5-plus-one because it includes the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council plus Germany, has sought unsuccessfully since 2006 to reach a deal with Iran on its nuclear program. The group wants Iran to abandon its program to enrich uranium, which Iran insists it needs to ensure an independent source of fuel for nuclear power plants. Highly enriched uranium can also be used in nuclear weapons, however, leading the United States and other Western nations to suspect that Iran secretly plans to divert the material to a weapons program.

Earlier this year, the group offered to provide economic and security benefits to Iran in return for suspension of Tehran’s enrichment activity and international oversight. The proposals delivered Wednesday amounted to Iran’s counteroffer.

In the interview, Samareh Hashemi called Washington’s Iran policy a “paradox” and said it was influenced by “Zionists.” He refused to confirm or deny that the Obama administration has sent two secret letters to Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, saying only that he would “respond later” to questions about the matter.

The top presidential aide said the United States has not submitted any request to open a consular office or interests section in Tehran, an idea that was floated in Washington last year. “If such a request comes, we will study it positively,” he said.

He said Iran has given the United States “practical proposals” in the past to improve relations, including a request for direct airline flights between Tehran and New York. “But the Americans gave no response,” he said.

Samareh Hashemi also called on the United States to apologize for “interfering in Iran’s election and other instances of meddling,” attacked America’s two-party political system and denounced “liberal democracy” in Western nations. “Both the internal and external signs of this Western liberal democracy show that it’s approaching defeat and collapse,” he said.

Ahmadinejad began a second presidential term last month after his government effectively crushed opposition protests over his disputed reelection in June. He has accused the West of orchestrating the protests.

Addressing the nuclear issue, Samareh Hashemi strongly rejected a senior U.S. diplomat’s accusation Wednesday that Iran “is now either very near or in possession” of enough low-enriched uranium to produce one nuclear weapon. The diplomat, Glyn Davies, Washington’s chief envoy to the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna, said in a speech, “We have serious concerns that Iran is deliberately attempting, at a minimum, to preserve a nuclear weapons option.” He charged that Iran’s continuing enrichment activity, in defiance of three U.N. Security Council resolutions, “moves Iran closer to a dangerous and destabilizing possible breakout capacity.”

Samareh Hashemi charged in reply that the United States is allowing its position on the issue to be dictated by Israel. “These are not the words of the Americans,” he said. “This is the Israelis speaking. It’s better that the Americans give their own opinion.”

“Iran not only does not want to make nuclear weapons, but is actually intensely against nuclear weapons,” said the aide, who managed Ahmadinejad’s reelection campaign and has held key positions in the Iranian Foreign and Interior ministries. “In all truth, Iran is trying to establish a new regime to prevent nuclear weapons worldwide.” He said the threat from nuclear weapons today comes from the countries that possess them, not from Iran.

Asked whether Iran’s proposal contains any mention of suspending its uranium enrichment program, Samareh Hashemi said that “methods of preventing development of nuclear weapons and a widespread system for preventing . . . the proliferation of nuclear weapons are a part of the package.”

He added: “Since nuclear weapons are an international threat, with the cooperation of all countries we can design an international framework that, basically, prevents research, production, multiplying and keeping nuclear weapons and also moves toward destruction of present nuclear weapons. Iran is ready in this path to offer any and every kind of cooperation and effort. No country must be exempt from this international framework against nuclear weapons. “

Iran maintains that its archenemy, Israel, possesses nuclear weapons, and it has often accused the West of having a double standard regarding Israel’s nuclear arsenal.

The International Atomic Energy Agency has said it has no conclusive evidence that Iran is trying to militarize its nuclear program, which Iran says is meant solely to generate electricity. But on Wednesday the agency said it was in a “logjam” with Iran and that there were still outstanding questions over the nature of its atomic program.

With the new package it is proposing, Iran wants to remove those doubts by establishing a broad international system that would force not only Iran but countries that have not signed the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, such as Israel, India and Pakistan, to be completely open about their nuclear intentions, Samareh Hashemi explained.

Giving up uranium enrichment, a key demand by the P5-plus-one group, is not necessary for Iran, he said. He argued that Iran’s nuclear activities are within the framework of the Non-Proliferation Treaty and abide by agreements and contracts made with the International Atomic Energy Agency. He said that signatories of the treaty, such as Iran, are entitled to enrich uranium. “It is very obvious that legal and lawful activities are the right of every nation,” Samareh Hashemi said.

It is Western countries that should change their ways, he said. “In fact, they divide the world into two groups: first-degree and second-degree humans,” he said.

Samareh Hashemi, who often goes on foreign missions for Ahmadinejad, announced an Iranian diplomatic offensive to reform the world’s power structures, which he said are promoting ” injustice.”

He called for the structure of the U.N. Security Council, with its “veto privilege for the permanent members,” to be changed to reflect what he described as new realities in the world.
The United States and other Western nations “are too irresponsible to run the world,” Samareh Hashemi said. “Naturally, everything needs to be changed.”

Staff writer Glenn Kessler in Washington and special correspondent Kay Armin Serjoie in Tehran contributed to this report.

Source

Iran is not at war with anyone. If anything they are the only peaceful country, when you consider what the rest of them are doing they make Iran look like a saint.

Those who are ordering about Iran are more dangerous. Especially Israel who apparently has about 300 nuclear bombs.

So who is going to protect Iran from Israel?

I think those who are complaining about Iran, should take a look in their own back yard.

Some should definitely practice what they preach.

“Exterminate all the Brutes”: Gaza 2009

Army rabbi ‘gave out hate leaflet to troops’,Israel: ’We Could Destroy All European Capitals’

By MoneyExtra.com/uk

This post is to draw your attention to an earlier post that I have updated. When an old post is updated, it’s sometimes easily hidden because not many people will refer back to old posts, and the only people who will see that update are first time readers. Because that update is an important one, I have decided to mention it here in a separate post and link back to it, and to also mention the circumstances that brought it to my attention.

In that earlier post, I included a statistic that looked great if you were to take it in isolation, but in fact came about because of a set of circumstances that do not indicate the intent of the point I was making. I quoted a statistic for the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant, that their number one turbine/generator unit delivered power for the statistical year of 2006 at an efficiency rate (Delivered Power vs Nameplate Capacity) of 101.2%. That may have been the case, but something like that is rare, when the average for the overall U.S. Nuclear Power is around 92.5%. The intent I mentioned that statistic was that it is indicative that these nuclear power plants can operate at a very high level of efficiency. It in fact came about because the Refuelling process was prior to the statistical year starting, and the next refuelling down time was after the statistical year finished. This plant can run for 18 months between down times for refuelling. It does however indicate that a plant of this nature can still ‘tick over’ at its maximum rate for those extended periods of time, and that its inherent design must be pretty good for it to be able to do that.

It was a coincidence that the matter was brought to my attention in the first place. I was searching around for a good image to include with a post that will come up later today. The images I could find were marginal, and not really suitable. I did stumble across one really good image, but it was from another source, and I was reticent to use it without the originators approval. I sent an email to the man whose site the image was posted at, not even sure if the website was still active. As it turned out I received a reply within hours. The site was a family site for a man who actually works at the Diablo Canyon Power Plant Facility, Jim Zimmerlin. (Jim Zim is his preference)

As it happens he read my last article in this Nuclear Electrical Power series (Part 11), because of the direct reference I had in it to the Diablo Canyon Facility. Ironically, he was actually going to contact me to point out the incorrect use of the statistic, but had not got around to it. Then I went and emailed him. It just shows what a small World it really is.

To Jim Zim, thank you for pointing out the anomalous nature of the stat that I used and also thanks for such a wonderful website with some startling images of the facility where he works. It was also really good to have information from someone actually working in that area, and I also thank him for the extra information he has also supplied to me.

For all you other readers here, I urge you to visit his site, not just to look at the stunning images, but to read the text that he has accompanying those images. What it shows most dramatically is that a facility of this nature is not only quite safe, and in fact, inordinately intensive measures are taken to keep it safe, but you can also read that even after working there for so long, 17 years now, his health has in no way been affected because of the work he does at that plant in such close proximity to those two nuclear reactors. In fact, I want you to specifically note where Jim mentions his health, and to take particular notice of the text about that.

This is the link to Jim Zim’s Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant site.

This is the link back to the updated post.

By Nick Loris

Despite the growing rhetoric in favor of affordable and clean energy in the United States, the regulatory trend is moving in the opposite direction. A recent article from Platts emphasizes the increasing regulatory costs for the nuclear industry:

“Benjamin Fowke, Xcel’s CFO, said in a second-quarter earnings conference call in late July that nuclear operating costs “probably” will continue to grow as US Nuclear Regulatory Commission regulatory fees and security requirements increase.

“We are seeing — and it is not just this year, it has been over several years now — a lot of increased security requirements, worker fatigue requirements, increased Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) fees — and they are not going away. They just keep coming,” he said.

Xcel spokeswoman Mary Sandok said in an e-mail Friday that NRC’s per reactor and inspection fees, combined with fees charged by other federal and state agencies and entities, had been growing at annual rate of 10%-12%. She said new NRC regulations, especially fitness-for-duty and fatigue rules that are taking effect this year, are significantly increasing staffing and other costs. “The cost increases are affecting nuclear plant operations nationwide,” she said.”

Regulatory preparedness is important, especially in the nuclear industry where public health and safety are and should be top priorities. Not one person has been injured as a result of commercial nuclear power in the U.S.—not even at Three Mile Island. Market viability is also important. And nuclear power now has a history of commercial success. Despite a radical anti-nuclear environmental movement, over-regulation, and too much government intervention, 104 reactors still provide Americans with 20 percent of their electricity emissions-free.

Despite this established track record of commercial viability, the fact is that overregulation is a primary reason for U.S. nuclear stagnation over the past three decades. Instead of working toward real regulatory reform, many proponents of nuclear power are more interested in mitigating regulatory risk by securing subsidies, mandates, and other taxpayer support. While such an approach may guarantee that whatever number of reactors the government decides to build will be built, it also guarantees that those reactors will cost too much and that the U.S. will never have a truly viable nuclear industry. The nuclear industry will be little more than another function of government.

Instead, the U.S. Congress and the Administration should institute a set of market-based policies that frees the nuclear industry to compete. It will be competition in the free-market that will yield a competitive, diverse, and sustainable nuclear industry. The market should dictate how many reactors get built in the U.S.—not a bunch of Washington bureaucrats.

To move the U.S. toward a market-based nuclear energy policy, Congress and the Administration should:

• Develop an Expedited Process for New Reactor Permits: The current schedule dictates that the NRC take four years under a best-case scenario to permit a new power plant. The NRC collaboratively with Congress should develop an expedited process for applicants that preemptively meet certain conditions. (link to pitts paper)

• Develop a Faster Process for Reactor Design Certification: A reactor design must be certified by the NRC before it can be used in a new power plant. This process should be streamlined, without sacrificing quality or safety, to allow for more efficient certification.

• Open Up to New Technologies: The NRC is currently very adept at regulating light-water reactors (the type of reactor in the U.S.) in a relatively slow growth environment; however, it is not prepared to efficiently regulate a diverse, growing, market-driven industry that could produce reactors both large and small. This becomes an obstacle to the introduction of new technologies. NRC must be reformed to allow for more competition within the nuclear industry.

• Begin Rulemaking for Reprocessing: While a geologic repository is crucial under any scenario, growth in nuclear power will likely necessitate that the U.S. also develop a reprocessing capacity as well, to help manage spent nuclear fuel. While the private sector should determine if such a facility is needed, the NRC should begin the rulemaking process now.

Contributing Author Nick Loris writes at The Heritage Foundation and he is a Research Assistant at The Heritage Foundation’s Roe Institute for Economic Policy Studies.

Read more informative articles at Heritage – The Foundry