"...over 60,000 between the USSR and the US... but thankfully we've got it down to a sensible 5 or 6 thousand warheads each now. It's still plenty to kill everybody on the planet 5 times over, but at least it's not enough to kill us 50 times over, which is where we were in the early 80s." https://dreamland.libsyn.com/generation-x-and-the-nuclear-nightmare
Alarm over nuclear safety lapses on the Clyde
"One incident in 2023 at the Faslane base, near Helensburgh, was given the MoD’s worst risk rating. This is the first time this has happened since 2008.
Remember: fossil fuel companies want people to focus on what uses#energy so we don't talk about the supply side.
They benefit from #environmentalists spending time and energy bickering with one another about whether AI uses too much #electricity, whether to support more #nuclear plants, whether we should mine more #lithium to have grid scale #batteries, and so forth.
That doesn't mean we can't talk about these things, but be #mindful where you spend your energy.
1.) France wants the lead
2.) France still has some scars from being taken by Germans in WWII
3.) the nuclear arms in France cost a fucking lot of money - so at least others (german) should fund it
PS: the US here only has some bombs meant to stop Russian tanks for some days until heavy airlift brings troops from the US to Europe. Thats the Idea.
In #Germany debate escalates about whether the #nuclear phase-out was justified granted its consequences for German economy that are becoming evident now. In the new turn, it is being suggested that the minister of economy Habeck was lied to by his own experts who claimed the phase-out is going to be harmless.^1
At this stage I can only reiterate that since 2011 when the plans were announced hundreds of worldwide climate experts appealed to Germany not to phase-out nuclear, which is one of the few low-carbon and dispatchable sources of energy. Climate scientist James Hansen had been calling German phase-out a “climate crime” and in 2019 hundreds of scientists wrote an open letter to German government asking to reconsider.^2
As I wrote a few years ago, the whole phase-out plan was plagued by cognitive biases, falsified data and excessive optimism about “prospective technologies of future”. The biggest blame however goes to “environmental activists” such as #WWF and #Greenpeace who were absolutely knowingly and cynically lying about both evils of nuclear and benefits of #renewables, convincing many people and pushing the government towards the current failure.^3
Russia vetoed a United Nations Security Council draft resolution to urge countries to comply with the 1967 Outer Space Treaty and prevent a nuclear arms race in space. Earlier this year, U.S. officials accused Moscow of developing a new satellite-destroying nuclear weapon. The resolution was drafted by Japan and the United States, who voted in favor along with 11 other members of the council. China abstained. Read more about the failed vote from Axios.
“#Russia vetoed UN resolution sponsored by US & Japan calling on all nations to prevent a dangerous #nuclear arms race in outer space.
The vote 15-member Security Council: 13 in favor, Russia opposed, China abstaining.
The resolution calls on all countries not to develop or deploy nuclear arms or other weapons of mass destruction in space, as banned under a 1967 international treaty that included the U.S. and Russia, and to agree to the need to verify compliance” https://apnews.com/article/175d45ddb658729eff060bd8a83b8a55
Unstable nuclear-waste dams threaten fertile Central Asia heartland
"Dams holding some 700,000 cubic meters (185 million gallons) of uranium mine tailings in Kyrgyzstan have become unreliable following a 2017 landslide. A further landslide or earthquake could send their contents into a river system used to irrigate Kyrgyz, Uzbek and& the Soviet-era radioactive waste disposal facility showed. That event would possibly displace millions in those three countries" https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/unstable-nuclear-waste-dams-threaten-fertile-central-asia-heartland-2024-04-23/#Nuclear
How a second #Trump presidency
could tear #Europe apart
This is the moment most of Europe’s leaders hoped they would never see. The date is November 7, 2024, two days after Donald Trump edged out Joe #Biden in the #US presidential election, and already the once-and-future president has announced he will force #Ukraine to strike a peace deal with #Russia and cede territories the #Kremlin has claimed as its own.