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We can settle issues of risk, but we cannot settle fear – at least, not without a great deal of effort. If you are afraid of snakes, you’re afraid of snakes – your snake loving friends won’t understand, but there it is. If you don’t live in a snaky area, the fear will never show itself, but if you do...

For the nuclear industry, safety is the top priority, and it goes to great lengths to minimize radiation exposure to the public and employees. So exhaustive are these measures that nuclear power plants only account for .1% of the annual radiation that a typical American is exposed to. Nearly half come...

Dr. Helen Caldicott For a number of years now, we've been sure to follow the public pronouncements of anti-nuclear activist Dr. Helen Caldicott and how the public is beginning to push back against her radical agenda . The latest example comes from the Sydney Morning Herald , where Caldicott's...

The Motley Fool offers a list of myths about nuclear energy, with an eye, as you might expect, to investing your hard-earned money into various projects. Writer Maxx Chatsko seems to really like TerraPower , which is fine, as long as we recognize that it is one of many projects out there. But we’re smart...

Industry/Regulatory/Political The operators of U.S. nuclear energy facilities last week approved a contract to develop two regional response centers that will store emergency equipment for rapid delivery in case of an extreme event at any nuclear plant. “The regional response centers will further increase...

Industry/Regulatory/Political The Japanese government’s Energy and Environment Council last week proposed a goal of phasing out nuclear energy “in the 2030s.” The new policy follows recent public surveys that indicate support for ending the country’s reliance on nuclear energy. The panel said the 48...

Last November, we told you about how the employees at the Onagawa nuclear energy facility in Japan played a critical role in sheltering local residents in the aftermath of the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami that struck the island nation. While the Onagawa facility remains safely shut down, its employees...

As a dedicated young leader in the nuclear energy industry, Kristine Madden, a reactor engineer at Entergy’s Palisades Nuclear Plant in Michigan, is actively involved in collaborating with colleagues to keep the plant safe. Besides pursuing a joint master’s degree in business administration and engineering...

Industry/Regulatory/Political The Japanese government and four regional power companies will announce electricity rationing contingency plans by mid-June. With all of Japan’s nuclear reactors offline, the government is predicting power shortages in the western and northern areas of the country...

Over the weekend, multiple media outlets reported that trace levels of radioactive Cesium had been found in Blue Fin Tuna caught off the coast of California. The radioactive particles had been picked up from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant (click here for the report), according to a report...

The following story originally appeared in NEI’s Nuclear Energy Overview. Radiation released during the accident at Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi facility was much lower than previously believed, according to a recently released World Health Organization report. The report gathers together more data about...

The Associated Press published a misleading article in newspapers across the country last week in which it largely calls into question some of the nuclear energy industry’s emergency preparedness programs . The article suggests that new changes to federal regulations were passed behind closed doors and...

When many of us think of robots, images of Wall-E, Optimus Prime, R2-D2 and other droids from our favorite science-fiction movies come to mind. However, robots have many critical real-life functions, including detecting bombs in war zones and assisting in recovery efforts at disaster areas. More recently...

Last week, I hinted that Dr. Helen Caldicott had gotten more than she had bargained for when she visited the University of South Carolina recently. Unfortunately, I failed to follow up and link to the following post at the Nuclear Literacy Project . The author is Kallie Metzger, a graduate fellow studying...

Yesterday, we made sure to note that Dr. Helen Caldicott was set to appear at the University of South Carolina to talk about the health effects of the incident at Fukushima -- all in an effort to point folks to more reliable sources of information on radiation and public health. In today's edition...

Over the weekend, I got a note from a friend that Dr. Helen Caldicott is scheduled to give a lecture tonight at the University of South Carolina on the medical implications of Fukushima. A little less than a month ago, Caldicott made a similar appearance in Santa Barbara. At the time, I posted the following...

Plant Update Preliminary results of an endoscopic examination of the interior of Fukushima Daiichi reactor 2 indicates that the water covering the damaged fuel at the bottom of the containment vessel is two feet deep. Tokyo Electric Power Co. said they were expecting the water level to be at least six...

A couple of days ago, a friend of mine passed some news onto me that Dr. Helen Caldicott is hitting the lecture circuit again, this time to talk about the health implications of the incident at Fukushima Daiichi. Her next event will take place tonight in Santa Barbara and will be sponsored by the Nuclear...

When a mega-quake followed by a massive tsunami struck Japan last March, the country’s defenses were overwhelmed by the scale of the natural disaster. While the earthquake and tsunami caused catastrophic destruction and significant loss of life, radiation released from the Fukushima Daiichi reactors...

Nearly a year after an earthquake and massive tsunami struck the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear energy facility in Japan, many U.S. experts still are in Japan assisting the recovery efforts. U.S. organizations with expertise and capabilities in nuclear energy mobilized quickly and offered critical help in...

The following story originally appeared in NEI’s Nuclear Energy Overview. Radiation health experts said at a Washington press briefing that based on the radiological data collected, the health effects of the Fukushima accident should be very minimal for both the public and workers. “From a radiological...

Plant Status Tokyo Electric Power Co. plans to cover about 17 acres of the seabed near the cooling water intakes of Fukushima Daiichi’s six reactors with a two-foot-thick mix of cement and clay. TEPCO said the project will prevent radioactive cesium and other materials from washing out to sea. The company...

Industry/Regulatory/Political A new seismic model will help operating U.S. nuclear facilities in the central and eastern United States reassess their seismic risks as part of efforts to implement lessons learned from the events at Fukushima Daiichi. The four-year study, conducted by the Electric Power...

How likely is it that a major accident at a nuclear energy facility would kill you? Japan just had such a major accident and no one died due to radiological exposure – there were industrial accidents at Fukushima that led to worker death but those were specific to occurring at a physical plant. The general...

The following story originally appeared in NEI’s Nuclear Energy Overview. Severe accidents at nuclear energy facilities would unfold more slowly and potential releases of radioactive material would be much smaller than earlier studies indicated, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission concludes in a new...