Anonymous ID: 9d3ede March 16, 2023, 5:55 p.m. No.18521189   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>1205 >>1210 >>1252 >>1288 >>1364 >>1397 >>1412

17 Mar, 2023 00:23

US nuclear plant admits to radioactive leak

A Minnesota facility disclosed tritium water spill after applying for license extension

 

(Are you fucking kidding me?)

 

Authorities in the northern US state of Minnesota revealed on Thursday that a nuclear power plant near Minneapolis had suffered aradioactive water spill amounting to over 1.5 million liters. Xcel Energy, which owns the Monticello Nuclear Generating Plant, is working to clean up the spill and insists there is no danger to the general public.

 

The Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) said that about 400,000 gallons of tritiated waterleaked from a broken pipeat the facility. The leak was first discovered onNovember 22, and its source was found onDecember 19and patched “soon after.”(wtf, how soon)

 

Authorities decided to keep the public in the dark about the incident, while Xcel Energy and the state were “actively managing” the situation to prevent the underground plume of irradiated water from spreading to the nearbyMississippi River, MPCA assistant commissioner Kirk Koudelka told the Minneapolis Star-Tribune.

 

“Now that we have all the information about where the leak occurred, how much was released into groundwater, and that contaminated groundwater had moved beyond the original location, we are sharing this information,” Minnesota Pollution Control Agency spokesman Michael Rafferty said on Thursday.

 

“This does not present a public health or drinking water issue,” said Christopher Clark, Xcel's president for Minnesota. He admitted the tritiated water is “well above” the 20,000 picocuries standard mandated by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), being “in the millions” directly below the plant.

 

The city of Monticello issued a statement saying its drinking water supply was not affected by the leak, which happened outside the area from which they draw groundwater for municipal wells.

 

The contaminated water has not been detected beyond the plant’s perimeter, Xcel told KMSP-TV. An estimated 25% of the water has been recovered and pumped into a treatment system on site. The company is considering building storage tanks or a retention pond for the project, which could take a year or more.

 

Viktoria Mitlyng, a spokeswoman for the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), said the leak was well below the NRC safety threshold and that the plan was not violating regulations. Tritium leaks “are not uncommon for nuclear plants,” she added.

 

The Monticello facility had a leak of about 2,000 gallons (7,500 liters) in 1981, with some of the water reaching the river, but state health officials said it posed no danger to wildlife or public health.

 

In January, Xcel sent an application to the NRC to extend Monticello’s license for another 20 years beyond 2030, when its current permit is set to expire. The company said the extension was “critical” to meet the new Minnesota law, which mandates 100% carbon-free electricity by 2040.

 

Tritium is a “mildly” radioactive isotope of hydrogen, often found in water used to cool nuclear reactors. The only way it can affect people is if they breathe it in or drink tritiated water, said Daniel Huff, an assistant commissioner at the Minnesota Department of Health, adding that the public’s exposure from a nuclear power plant “should be zero.”

 

https://www.rt.com/news/573108-monticello-nuclear-tritium-leak/

 

We can never trust any of them!

Anonymous ID: 9d3ede March 16, 2023, 6:01 p.m. No.18521233   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>1252 >>1257 >>1364 >>1397

16 Mar, 2023 23:51

 

West warns Ukraine not to blow ‘last ditch effort’ – NYT

 

The US and UK are trying to scrounge up ammunition for a “spring offensive,” officials say

(That title means they blew many other opportunities, and the West is finished, y announcing they are fuck ups)

 

A New York Times story on Thursday suggested that the US and its allies are running out of ammunition they can supply to Ukraine, while Kiev is using up the troops and shells that will be needed for a planned spring offensive to fight for Artyomovsk instead.

 

Called Bakhmut by the Kiev authorities, Artyomovsk is now almost entirely surrounded by Russian forces. Ukrainian troops attempting to hold the town are running out of ammunition, the Times reported, with one brigade commander complaining of a “catastrophic shortage” of artillery shells.

 

Some US and EU officials now worry that Ukraine is using up “thousands” of shells a day in the battle for Artyomovsk, at a pace that is “unsustainable” and “could jeopardize a planned springtime campaign” that Kiev’s western sponsors “hope will prove decisive,”according to the Times.

 

The Pentagon has reportedly even “raised concerns” with Kiev about this, warning Ukraine about “wasting ammunition.”

 

The US and its allies “did not stockpile weaponry in anticipation of supplying an artillery war,” the outlet noted. A “secret British task force” is trying to track down and buy Soviet-caliber ammunition from around the world. The US and NATO have managed to put together some shells, but they are supposed to be used in the upcoming offensive.

 

One Pentagon official described the push as a “last-ditch effort,” because theWest does not have enough ammunitionto keep up with Ukrainian expenditures.

 

NATO’s own stocks are “critically low” and it will take “many months” for efforts to boost production to have an effect, again according to the Times. Without artillery, the paper explained, “hundreds” of new tanks and armored vehicles that the West is sending Ukraine will have a “limited” effect.

 

Theanonymous officialswho spoke to the Times also claimed that Ukrainian casualties have been so severe, with “more than 100,000” troops wounded or killed so far, that Kiev must decide whether to hold onto Artyomovsk or save soldiers for the “one meaningful opportunity this year” to go on the offensive.

 

Though the US has tried to downplay the significance of Artyomovsk, President Vladimir Zelensky has decided to hold the town at seemingly all cost, declaring there is no part of Ukraine that can be abandoned.

 

The only logic of “expending so much blood and ammo” on the town would be to “drain Russia of resources and prevent its troops from heading farther west,” Camille Grand, NATO’s former assistant secretary general for defense investment and now a defense expert at the European Council on Foreign Relations, told the Times. “The alternative is that they got dragged into a situation that, in the long term, plays in Russia’s favor and now it’s difficult to get out of it.”

 

https://www.rt.com/russia/573107-ukraine-artillery-shortage-nyt/

 

Comms???

Anonymous ID: 9d3ede March 16, 2023, 6:11 p.m. No.18521321   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>1364 >>1397

16 Mar, 2023 21:09

==Serbian president speaks on Russia sanctions after scandal=

Aleksandar Vucic told reporters that he, and not some minister, will announce any policy changes

 

Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic brushed off the demands of one of his cabinet ministers to join the EU sanctions against Russia, telling reporters on Thursday that the long-standing policy might change only if there is no other way.

 

“Our position is to not impose sanctions,”Vucic told reporters in Belgrade, before departing for North Macedonia for talks regarding the breakaway province of Kosovo.

 

Implying that this policy might be changed only in “circumstances when there is no way out,”Vucic said he, Prime Minister Ana Brnabic and Foreign Minister Ivica Dacic would know best if and when that became the case, adding that he would make such an announcement personally.

 

Whether that is within a month or five months, I don’t know. But our policy has persisted for over a year under the most difficult conditions,and no Basta will change it.

 

Vucic was responding to social media posts by Economy Minister Rade Basta, who earlier this week argued that Belgrade should sanction Moscow because the Western pressure was becoming unbearable. Basta’s own party disavowed his comments, and some members of the ruling coalition called for his resignation.

 

Individual ministers can’t go to the public with positions that are opposed to the majority of their colleagues in the cabinet, Vucic told reporters. As of Thursday, Basta remains in his post.

 

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova reacted by saying it was strange that Basta was complaining about Russia but did not seem to mind US and EU pressure. Basta tried to make a point that Zakharova was herself under Western sanctions, asking her to come to dinner in Serbia “if she could find a way to come.” The Russian diplomat politely reminded the Serbian minister it was Lent, but that she would gladly visit one of Moscow’s many Serbian restaurants after Easter.

 

Serbia has resisted pressure from the EU and the US to sanction Russia over the conflict with Ukraine, pointing out that the West is demanding Belgrade recognize Kosovo as independent but insisting on territorial integrity for Kiev.

 

Vucic is scheduled to meet with US and EU envoys and the leader of Kosovo’s ethnic Albanian government in Ohrid on Friday, to discuss the so-called Franco-German “normalization” plan.

 

The document, made public by the EU last month, includes provisions that would require Serbia to de facto recognize Kosovo and “harmonize” its foreign policy with Brussels, meaning sanctions against Russia.

 

https://www.rt.com/news/573105-serbia-russia-sanctions-president/

 

I think he was insinuating“and no Bastard will change it”kek