On December 21st 2006 the Inspectorate was notified by te Customs Office at Rotterdam Maasvlakte that they had a radiation alarm of their portal detector. Using handheld survey equipment an enhanced radiation level at the surface of a 20 ft container of 1.5 microSieverts per hour could be determined. The container identification number is FCIU 260145-9. The container was unloaded by the VROM-Inspectorate South-West Unit. The container was completely filled with several types of bags, most of them ladies handbags. An enchanced radiation level at the surface of 44 of these handbags of at most 35 microsieverts per hour was measured, due to the presence of cobalt-60. Several handbags were further examined by a specialised firm. The cobalt-60 was incorporated in the buckle of the shoulder strap of the handbags. The activity was calculated to be at least 38 kBq per handbag. The total activity of the cobalt-60 was calculated to be at least 1.6 MBq. The handbags were manufactured in India. The buckles with the cobalt-60 contamination were supplied by K.S. International, Kolkata, India, in a total amount of 141 pieces. The 44 buckles with cobalt-60 will be transported to COVRA, the radioactive waste facility in the Netherlands.
Everywhere you look, the nuclear industry’s hype machine is in overdrive. Goldman Sachs, Microsoft, and the UK government all tout small modular reactors as the silver bullet for climate change and energy security. Tech billionaires are hiring nuclear veterans. Wall Street is whispering about “round-the-clock power” for artificial intelligence data centers. For those old enough […]
Kernenergie en veiligheid: A wargame sought to test if a major radiological release that would prompt the evacuation of millions of civilians in South Korea could distract key US allies from assisting and rebuffing an all-out military invasion of Taiwan. The short answer was yes. The game originally presumed that China, wanting to keep the […]
Big batteries and EVs to the rescue again as faults with new nuclear plant cause chaos on Nordic grids The Finnish nuclear power plant Olkiluoto was finally connected to the grid last year, at an estimated cost of €11 billion compared to the original budget of €3 billion. That cost blowout forced its developer, the […]
A vast subsea nuclear graveyard planned to hold Britain’s burgeoning piles of radioactive waste is set to become the biggest, longest-lasting and most expensive infrastructure project ever undertaken in the UK. The project [UK's nuclear waste dump] is now predicted to take more than 150yrs to complete with lifetime costs of £66bn in today’s money...The […]
Last year, the Dutch Province of Limburg started an alliance in which, besides the local government, research institutes, small nuclear reactor (SMR) developers, utilities, industrial customers and funders cooperated. With this "Limburg SMR alliance" Limburg tried to lead the way towards an SMR in Limburg. The preferred site for a first SMR would be Chemelot, […]
