Reuters: Entergy reduces Vermont Yankee reactor to fix leak
’NEW YORK, June 24 (Reuters) - Entergy Corp (ETR.N) said it has reduced the 620-megawatt Vermont Yankee nuclear power station on Tuesday to locate and fix a leak of river water into the plant's condenser. The unit was operating at about 41 percent early Wednesday down from about 95 percent early Tuesday, according to a U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission report. Since early June, operators had been tracking indications of the leak. The company said in an email on Tuesday it started to prepare for the power reduction several weeks ago. The company said fixing a problem like this usually takes several days. In addition to fixing the leak, workers will conduct other maintenance during the power reduction including replacement of equipment associated with recirculation pump controls and a sensor associated with a regulating valve in the feedwater system.’

BBC News: N Korea defends nuclear programme
’North Korea has stepped up its missile programme in recent weeks. North Korea has boasted of being a "proud nuclear power" and warned the US that it will strike back if attacked. The statement came after US President Barack Obama said Washington was "fully prepared" for a possible North Korean missile test. There have been recent warnings in South Korean and Japanese newspapers that the North is preparing another long-range missile launch. The UN toughened sanctions against the North after a nuclear test on 25 May. The North has also recently test-fired a number of short-range missiles recently, and in April launched a long-range rocket - which it said was to put a satellite into orbit but which the US said was a missile test.
Military analysts say North Korea's longest-range missile - the Taepodong-2 - has the potential range to reach Hawaii and parts of Alaska.’

National Review Online: How Not to Restrain Iran
’The current Iranian election crisis has created more political uncertainty in Iran than any other event since the 1979 revolution. At a minimum, promised U.S. nuclear talks with Tehran have been delayed to avoid the appearance of political "meddling" (i.e., of dealing with an Iranian president whose legitimacy is in dispute). Still, no one in the White House believes the current crisis or its resolution will alter how the U.S. should approach the Iranian nuclear threat. Unfortunately, this hard-nosed political realism is married to an egregiously naive view of what kind of nuclear deal the U.S. should seek. Foggy Bottom's best are now quietly insisting that we need to be more "flexible" and "pragmatic" in our proposed nuclear talks with Iran. The Iranians, they note, are only months away from acquiring enough nuclear fuel to make a bomb. Therefore, insisting or building upon the United Nations's repeated demands that Iran suspend its "civilian" fuel-making operations is a fool's errand. Instead, the State Department mandarins suggest, America and its key allies should let Iran "save face" - that is, we should allow Tehran to manufacture a small amount of nuclear fuel while demanding increased inspections and multilateral management of its nuclear program. This is a far more modest goal than getting Iran to stop making nuclear fuel, but, they contend, it is the best we can hope for.’

Reuters: Canada still unsure on isotope reactor repair plan
’VANCOUVER, British Columbia (Reuters) - Repair crews are still trying to determine how to fix an aging Canadian nuclear reactor that produces a third of the world's medical isotope supply, officials said on Wednesday. The Chalk River reactor in eastern Ontario has been out of operation since May 17 because of a heavy water leak, and officials say they cannot predict exactly when it can be restarted until a repair plan is completed. They tentatively estimated in mid-May that the facility would be down for at least three months. Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd said operators had removed the reactor's fuel, control and isotope rods, and reduced the rate of the leak -- which officials say does not pose a threat to the general public.’

Whitehaven News: Thorp's future secure - NDA
’THORP's future at Sellafield is secure despite the troubled reprocessing plant having to shutdown for seven months for maintenance and engineering work. In an exclusive interview with The Whitehaven News, Sellafield's legal owners, the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority, has given Thorp a vote of confidence to carry on for another six years and complete a multi-billion pounds order book. "Thorp's future is not under review," pledged Ian Hudson, the NDA's man on the spot at Sellafield. GMB site convenor Peter Kane said: "It's great news for the workforce." Thorp employs around 1,500 but many more jobs at Sellafield and in the community depend on its reprocessing operations. After a recent crisis caused by the failure of one of Sellafield's three process evaporators, Cumbrian anti-nuclear group Core said Thorp was "on a knife's edge" and called for the plant to be closed.’

The Guardian: Duke CEO sees nuclear front-runners emerging
’SAN FRANCISCO, June 24 (Reuters) - Duke Energy Corp Chief Executive Jim Rogers sees Areva and Toshiba's Westinghouse emerging as front-runners in the design of reactors for a much-anticipated U.S. nuclear revival. While Rogers felt there was room for more than one reactor technology, he said GE Hitachi seemed to be overshadowed by the aggressive approach of the other two firms. "You're already starting to see a sorting out," he said in an interview on the sidelines of a San Francisco meeting of the U.S. power industry, hosted by the Edison Electric Institute. Duke, the third-largest U.S. nuclear power provider, has applied to build two Westinghouse reactors in South Carolina. But the company said last week it was also looking at building a 1,600-megawatt reactor in Ohio with France's Areva, along with uranium enrichment company USEC Inc and UniStar -- a joint venture of U.S.-based Constellation Energy Group Inc and Electricite de France SA.’

Deseret News: Utah appeals ruling on Italian nuclear waste
’State attorneys officially filed notice of their appeal of a federal court ruling which said EnergySolutions Inc. falls outside the regulatory purview of the Northwest Interstate Compact. The appeal of the May ruling had been anticipated for weeks, in light of U.S. District Judge Ted Stewart's decision that dealt a blow to the state and compact's efforts to block EnergySolutions' plan to import low-level radioactive waste from Italy. The waste, intended for disposal at the company's 439-acre facility in Tooele County's west desert, would occupy 4.3 acres of the total site and is no more "hot" than waste the site currently accepts, company officials have said. Still, vehement opposition by the state, watchdog groups and the compact led to the federal court battle that played out this year in a set of two separate rulings by Stewart, delivering victory to EnergySolutions on both fronts.’