Jadugoda: The disgusting underbelly of India's nuclear industry

Paid a visit yesterday to our planetary caretaker friends over at Intercontinental Cry and have since spent every possible online moment educating myself about India’s uranium and nuclear power industries. Crazed and wanton don’t even begin to cover it. Uranium mining is consistently written off as a necessary evil by nuclear energy advocates, including some among the ‘Stop Climate Change’ crowd, who are evidently willing to sacrifice anything in the interests of clean air and predictable weather patterns. Don’t get me wrong, i care about air quality, extreme weather, desertification, etc. as much as any environmentalist, but i don’t believe nuclear power is the solution, in large part because of the actual power source, which is not some monolithic, theoretically earthquake-proof reactor, but uranium ore, mined on a massive scale, generating a lethal legacy to which ‘long-term’ doesn’t do justice.

Jadugoda has been referred to as ‘India’s Navajo Nation’, which under any other circumstances would be considered a great compliment, given the incredible beauty of Navajo lands. Located in the eastern state of Jharkhand, it has a 40+ year history of uranium mining and levels of contamination and negative health effects that reflect this. While it may be true that Jharkhand is an ‘environmentally friendly state [that] has lots of tourism potential. Whether you like pristine nature or the thrill of adventure, whether you are on a religious introspection, or health rejuvenation, Jharkhand can enchant your senses,’ with an estimated 48,000 tonnes of uranium ore in its bedrock, it seems fair to say that enchantment will require some strategic touring, a lengthy list of areas to avoid.

The problems at Jadugoda detailed in a 2010 WISE-Uranium report include displaced persons, political repression of displaced persons, a long, on-going history of labor union strikes, repeated pipeline bursts and tailings spills, health crises and lack of responsible government oversight. Given that the Uranium Corporation of India Ltd. (UCIL) is a public sector holding of India’s Department of Atomic Energy (DEA), the level of government complicity in ignoring and/or denying the problems at all of the country’s uranium mines is hardly a shock. It’s important to note that UCIL not only operates 6 mines in Jharkhand, but also has ore processing plants there to leach the ore and then mill the uranium for use in nuclear reactors. A public hearing is being held today to discuss UCIL's plans to extend the life of the Jadugoda mine, and while one wants to hope said extension will be denied, the overall picture of India’s nuclear ambitions leads this writer to expect otherwise.

The Jharkhandi Organization Against Radiation (JOAR) has been staging protests locally and at UCIL hearings for many years now, in addition to conducting their own environmental and health monitoring activities. The film Buddha weeps in Jadugoda offers an in-depth look at what they have been faced with and is full of personal testimonies that certainly rival the horrific experiences of those still suffering from the Bhopal catastrophe. . In one segment of the film, a Deputy Manager of a mill is speaking to a group of local villagers and, after explaining how there will be little uranium left in the waste stream, he has the audacity to make the situation sound almost poetic:

yes, the harmful dust may fly over you

but it is as safe as the sand in the river

but do not worry

we are here to protect you

the energy rays that come out will not reach your homes

it will become gas and go up

without harming you in any way

i'm convinced people gets these kinds of managerial jobs not because they're good managers or engineers, but because they get high marks when it comes to treating others with arrogance, hubris and outright idiocy. Here is part 4 of the film, focusing on the health problems people have been facing. Indian Doctors For Peace And Development published a study in 2007, Black Magic of Uranium at Jadugoda, which documents these at several villages near mining sites. They found that 4.5% mothers reported congenital birth defects, while nearly 10% report death of infants due to congenital defects. Higher rates of sterility and cancers affect the indigenous people disproportionately.

Reading about situations like this always leads me to ask about motivation; in this case, what is driving India to produce so much uranium. i found a very informative slide show put together by UCIL, reflecting such bold ambitions for India’s nuclear power program that one can’t help but wonder if these folks have been drinking the contaminated village water. The country has a 3 stage nuke power program that includes Pressurized Heavy Water Reactors, Boiling Water Reactors, Faster Breeder Reactors and Thorium-based reactors; they are also planning to construct 2 VVERs (Russian designed). The projected power potentials (in megawatts) go from 10,000 MWe in Stage One (PHWRs), to 530,000 MWe in Stage Two (Fast Breeder Reactors), to POWER POTENTIAL IS VERY LARGE in Stage Three (Thorium Based Reactors). Surely and under the circumstances, ‘very large’ is an inadequate, fantasy caliber assessment for long-term energy output. If AREVA or TEPCO came out with that, you know the stockholders would just laugh them out of the boardroom. At any rate, India’s DEA has big plans for a so-called clean energy future, but like all grande national plans, ironies abound.

In addition to the irony of devastating environment and health with more and bigger uranium mines in order to ‘go clean’, the country will still need to import uranium and this they are having trouble doing because of their refusal to sign the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT). In 2008, Kevin Rudd got the Australian government to veto selling uranium to India until it signed the NPT, and since then, other countries have joined the ban against uranium sales to New Delhi. According to The Australian, ‘Depletion of its uranium reserves caused India's production of nuclear power to fall last decade. Its 19 nuclear plants produce only 4 per cent of its electricity, but that level is expected to doubled over the next 25 years as new plants are commissioned.’ The irony, of course, is that the purpose of the NPT was to promote ‘peaceful’ i.e. energy, applications of nuclear materials, yet even though India needs the energy more than it needs a few hundred nuclear warheads, they are sacrificing the former out of principle (i suppose) to possess the latter. Never fear, a solution is at hand. Bloomberg reported earlier this month that Nuclear Power Corp. of India is considering a venture with state-run UCIL to start buying mines overseas. Maybe they’ll move into Navajo country, wouldn’t that be ironic to the extreme?

There are few issues as pressing as energy in this century, because its ripple effects are so strong. JOAR and its peer organizations at uranium mines around the world may not have all the answers, though my guess is that they are probably more concerned than the rest of us when it comes to finding a way forward for energy and climate that incorporates values of environmental justice and sustainability into the broader equation. Uranium mining runs counter to those values, and no matter how clean and advantageous the nuclear power lobby makes those reactors look, there is no escaping what lies underneath them, no way around the damage inflicted by uranium mining. I, for one, do not want to see a group of congenitally damaged descendants who live atop tailing sites left carrying the ball after the last reactor is shut down, cracked apart or washed away in a tsunami.

Time for a musical interlude

Nobel Appease Prize

The Obama love fest marches on. How utterly bizarre that he has received this honor immediately after declining to meet with another Nobel Laureate... hard not to notice that among all the commentaries and congratulations, the Dalai Lama's reaction is conspicuously absent. Is the Nobel Committee trying to subvert Obama's stated intention to intensify military action in Afghanistan by handing him a check that reads 'Man of Peace', or do they just want their own private audience with the guy? Historically, the prize has been awarded to individuals who've taken real, substantive personal risks in the interests of justice, peace and planet, or embraced platforms crucial for moving in that direction (think of Al Gore and the IPCC); i may be missing something in his background, but it doesn't seem to me that Obama qualifies under either of these criteria.

Last weekend i met a Danish woman who asked if i was happy about Obama becoming president, flashing me that semi-glazed over, starry-eyed look that i've come to recognize as the spell of saviordom. People so desperately want to believe that Obama is "the answer", the man who will make all things bad in the world go away or transform into bite-sized bits of goodness. It feels too cynical to dispel anyone's optimism; yet, from another perspective, one could argue that encouraging the worship of a well-marketed elected official reflects an even deeper level of psychic despair. Thus far, Obama has not managed to deliver much more than drone attacks on impoverished villages, appeasement towards zionist extremists and guaranteed, unrestrained profits to big pharmaceutical companies. My conversation with the woman from Denmark demonstrated yet again the extent to which Europeans still want to believe that the US can set things right in the world, and how willing we all are to ignore what we don't want to see in order to keep whatever dream we harbor alive - be it a savior nation or a savior from Chicago.

There are those who have argued that the Nobel Peace Prize lost all credibility back in 1973, when it was awarded to Henry Kissinger - in the same year that he orchestrated the overthrow of Allende, condemning the Chilean people to over a decade of inexcusable repression. i am not going to shame myself by challenging that position, since i think the Norwegians would have better served the interests of peace by arresting Kissinger the minute he stepped off the plane. Perhaps my reaction to Obama winning is just a matter of selective or short-term memory, of not wanting to accept that something i'd like to believe has substantive meaning has actually been devoid of it for at least several decades. i suppose i should be thankful that if persona marketability was their main criteria, at least the Committee didn't select Angelina Jolie.

At this time, one hopes that the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize recipient will take a moment to reflect on the words of Martin Luther King, Jr. when he accepted his award in 1964.

I am mindful that debilitating and grinding poverty afflicts my people and chains them to the lowest rung of the economic ladder.

Therefore, I must ask why this prize is awarded to a movement which is beleaguered and committed to unrelenting struggle; to a movement which has not won the very peace and brotherhood which is the essence of the Nobel Prize.

After contemplation, I conclude that this award which I receive on behalf of that movement is profound recognition that nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral question of our time -- the need for man to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to violence and oppression.

Civilization and violence are antithetical concepts.

This morning i received an email from moveon.org which claimed that the primary reason Obama won the award is his push for nuclear disarmament. On this, i would refer you to Thomas Pickering's recent commentary in the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists: "...the Obama administration will at least continue to look seriously at the possibility of missile defense, focusing less on a frenetic commitment to early deployment and more on bringing it to its full technical capability." Their clock is still set at 5 minutes to midnight, so while the potential to move away from nuclear war may be greater than it was a year ago, our experts at the Bulletin have yet to lower the threat level.

Also want to tag on a quote from someone at Israel Radio, just to illustrate how convoluted perspectives on the Nobel Prize - or perhaps peace, itself - can become. "Almost nine months of pregnancy at the White House has not given birth to one peace or any [significant] progress under the inspiration of American president.... Whoever had hope that President Obama would lead a military operation against Tehran, today those hopes have evaporated. A Noble Peace Prize laureate doesn't rush into to any war." Does that need deconstruction?? According to the Secret Service, death threats to Obama are up 400% since his inauguration. The racist anti-sanity birthers [sic] are taunting him left and right, but who would be surprised if the first tangible attack came from an agent of zionism? Yet that surely won't happen in Oslo, so we can all start stocking up on popcorn and rhetoric, in preparation for another monumental speech and a blogophere frenzy to prove it so.

earth2tycho blogging/not blogging update

As i don't want to start with an apology and thereby discredit myself out of the gate, i'm writing to let you know, first of all, that i've updated my links lists a bit and have added an RSS feed. If you have faith that i'm going to come back to life here and offer up acid punch bowls full of witty, if not brilliant, insights into the nature of existence in the 21st century, then by all means feel free to subscribe. i believe you'll get an email every time i post something new, a useful psychological tool for your disheveled writer, who could then use her blog posts in lieu of writing personal emails and thus avoid being accused of neglecting friends' inboxes. i've also added a Personal Links gadget, if you want to check out what strikes me as worth saving from the Guardian or read my anti-Bush limericks at MySpace.

My old comrade Jim is now working with the franciscans at Nevada Desert Experience, involved in various Las Vegas community works as well as maintaining their decades-long focus on shutting down the Nevada Nuclear Test Site and returning the land to its rightful owners, the Western Shoshone Nation. Kudos to Jim for being willing to live in Vegas and may the neon lights of Sin City not blind him. They're scheduled to do another action this week as part of Keep Space for Peace International Week of Protest to Stop the Militarization of Space. Coordinated through the Global Network Against Weapons and Nukes in Space, i believe the lengthy names of both event and organization speak for themselves.

This past summer, i also hooked up with Che Sudaka from Barcelona, a frenetic band with a big ska-loving heart. They have taken on the independence movement in Western Sahara as a cause celebre and deserve lots of kudos for doing so, it is a much-ignored part of the world aside from in Morocco, which insists on occupying it. This territory has the unique honor (?) of being the last place in Africa where one can still see the "curious institution" of slavery, alive but hardly well... More on that probably at a later date - CS are a great band and you should definitely go see them and support their work if they play in your locale.

Now for the apology.... well, not exactly an apology, but i've been getting lots of positive feedback about the blog and consequently, some ??'s about why i've been neglecting it in these trying times, so i feel i owe my small but illustrious fan base an acknowledgment (along with a note of thanks!) that yes, i've been a total flake in terms of producing words, but largely this is due to too much uptake of other people's babble... informative but mesmerizing... and i can be very easily mesmerized, especially when sick and trying to make sense of something that at heart, i really could care less about. Specifically, that would be the Obama-McCain-Palin circus and the public coffers bailout of Wall Street heavies, with its ripple effects throughout the globalized economy. At this point, i think i'm following the US election stuff out of pure addiction (it sure beats Brad and Britney); this must be so since the first song i listen to every morning is now Ship of Fools. Aside from Tina Fey's and Alec Baldwin's great Palin impersonations, the US electoral spam is not even entertaining. Just insane nastiness, and stupidity, more of the same old crap: nuclear vs. extinction, killing Iraqis vs. killing Pakistanis, helping the rich get richer vs. being rich and becoming richer... Palin's bounty on wolf paws is nauseating - literally - and she's yakking nonsense about climate change while her fellow - native - Alaskans are literally seeing their land disappear underneath a rising sea level. The Comedy Central folks have been on her ass big time, there's really not much i personally can add to their analysis. John McCain is a major creep and anyone who thinks he's a leader must also harbor secret fantasies about immolating Sikhs and polar bears.

As far as financial news is concerned, it's hard for someone who's never been very interested in money/finance to suddenly dig in and collect hoards of details which, all told, only reinforce my original position that the unreal nature of extreme wealth creates its own kharma of deserved yet likewise (somehow) unreal extreme crises. However, like everyone else whose got nothing to lose, i do have thoughts about the what's happening and a load of links to share offering comprehensible, tho sometimes offbeat, analyses of what's happened and where it's all potentially going. Subscribe to the blog and be the first to read a (loosely) anthropological deconstruction of the capitalist neaderthals' road to perdition.

Ok, that's my awkward lumbering back into the blogosphere after an undesired and delinquent hiatus. Leaving you with this curious piece about Truman Show Delusion, the ultimate 21st century plague, a culmination of all that individualism has to offer.

Following up on my recent post about the US-India nuclear deal, Reuters is reporting today that at least 40 private companies (Indian) are now lobbying their government to allow privately owned and operated nuclear power plants. It's a nice idea, diversifying the energy sector and not putting the entire financial burden of that on the state. i'd put it in the same league as applauding oil companies for their leadership in finding a way out of our addiction to petroleum. As a wise man once said, "To hell with facts! We need stories!" One story we can always depend on hearing from the private sector is that in the event of fiscal or material meltdown, the burden of bailout and clean-up must fall on the shoulders of the state.

This is yet another facet of the nuke industry's self-deception. Clean and efficient electricity production? Sure, as long as one doesn't take into account uranium mining and processing, spent nuclear fuel reprocessing, transportation hazards, long-term waste storage (let's say 24,000 years minimum), rampant plant cost overruns and impacts of any accidental releases or Chernobyl style meltdown. You can bet that as soon as detectors in Abu Dhabi start picking up high levels of cesium, the Indian government would be asked to step in and manage the emergency response. (If i remember correctly, Exxon was not in charge of trying to salvage the oil-soaked animals who happened to find themselves in the Valdez' spill zone... notice any kind of pattern here?) These nuke people are just living in a dream world and yes, i'd certainly add Candidate Obama to the list of dreamers. Building NPPs in a country whose basic infrastructure is either collapsing or on the verge of collapse is pure stupidity. Building them in countries which are disastrously impacted by earthquakes, monsoons, hurricanes and tsunamis increases the stupidity variable ten-fold. They consume a huge amount of resources to build and maintain, leave a wake of environmental havoc, and pose too great a risk in a world run by incompetent extremists.

......

Few days later. Reading this again, i realized that i neglected to point out that the US "civilian" nuclear power industry was privatized from the get-go and is a good case in point against privatization. elsewhere. The weapons manufacturing network is a joint private-public venture: GE, Dupont, Westinghouse.... all of whom also profit from the civilian nuke sector. (Ironically, in some aspects the two were more distinct in the USSR than the US.) The nuke lobby likes to claim that the number of accidents and other mishaps at US NPPs is very low, but they are not including the weapons plants, managed by the very same corporations. These places are so dirty, their workers suffer the same health crises as veterans of atomic tests, and the only reason we know so much more about the nightmare that is Hanford, et al. and have seen so much more effort put into cleaning them up is because they are ultimately owned by the DOE. Investigating the history of any NPP, one sees a lot more near disasters than might be expected and a whole lot less transparency. The companies have not built up the piggy banks they are required by law to have - a set percentage of plant costs, annually - to collectively pay for a permanent waste storage site. Cooling ponds are filling up, the current nuke waste dump has or will soon reach capacity and stop accepting wastes - this is a big problem, and the taxpayers are going to end up paying the utilities again (essentially) to deal with it because inaction is not an option.

Energy production is too crucial and complex to manage on the basis of profits. On the basis of economics - sure, of course, we must - but even that needs to come through a democratic decision-making process, which is not what private energy companies are about. Remain ever vigilant, the guys are not to be trusted on any continent.

Yet another "height of hypocrisy" from Washington

Al-Jazeera is reporting that the US is pushing to remove the ban on nuclear materials trade with India. The hypocrisy here should be obvious: India is no longer a signatory to the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT), already possesses nuclear weapons, and is not open to IAEA inspections because it is not part of the NPT regime. Compare this to Iran's nuclear status and therein lies the rub.

According to al-Jazeera, "Diplomats close to the suppliers group talks say that France, Russia, Canada, Brazil and South Africa are in favour of an agreement." Let's take a guess as to which countries are engaged in marketing their nuclear technologies in new Delhi, should the exemption for purchase be granted. As far as the US nuclear industry goes, this is one way to build up the necessary wad of investment cash for the much-touted maniacal rejuvenation of the US nuclear power industry - it's been well over 20 years since any new plants were built - on top of the normal military tech profiteering that helps firms like Lockheed Martin maintain their company yachts. The US Congressional Research Service published an interesting report about US-India relations last year; start reading on p. 31 if you'd like to see how many billions in weapons are being sold and to get some idea of Israel's role in assuring the flow of arms into Asia continues to increase.