International

The development of a full-scale carbon capture and storage chain in Norway is possible by 2022, according to a feasibility study report issued Monday by the Ministry of Petroleum and Energy. “Wide deployment of CCS is necessary for the world to reach its climate goals. The most important goal of a full-scale project in Norway […]

French multinational AREVA on Friday announced that it had completed the sale of nuclear instrumentation and measurement subsidiary Canberra. The sale to Mirion Technologies was announced last December, months before AREVA declared a more ambitious restructuring last month. “The sale of Canberra to Mirion is in line with our previously announced restructuring plan and our […]

Sweden’s radiation safety agency on Wednesday offered a show of support for plans to establish a permanent repository for spent nuclear fuel near the east coast village of Forsmark. “The Swedish Radiation Safety Authority has assessed that the Swedish Nuclear Fuel and Waste Management Company (SKB) has the potential to comply with the Authority’s nuclear […]

Rose Gottemoeller, U.S. undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, has been appointed as the next NATO deputy secretary general, Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg announced Monday. Gottemoeller is set to replace Alexander Vershbow, a veteran U.S. ambassador who has served in the NATO position since 2012, the statement said. Gottemoeller will begin her […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) sent the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine an emergency shipment worth approximately $2.3 million after 29 radiation portal monitors were destroyed in Ukraine in fighting between the government and separatists. NNSA spokeswoman Francie Israeli offered more details by email after a June 17 Government Accountability Office report highlighted the destroyed […]

St. Vincent and the Grenadines on Wednesday submitted to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change its instrument of ratification for the Paris climate change agreement. The entry into force of the Paris Agreement is a three-step process requiring parties to adopt, then sign, and then ratify the accord. Nearly 200 nations in December […]

The United Kingdom will strive to cut its carbon emissions 57 percent from 1990 levels by 2030, the Department of Energy and Climate Change announced Thursday in its fifth carbon budget. “This Order sets the carbon budget for the 2028–2032 budgetary period (1,725 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent). Carbon budgets set a cap on […]

The release of the United Kingdom’s fifth carbon budget, required by the nation’s 2008 Climate Change Act by the end of June, has not gotten lost in the shuffle of the “Brexit,” Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change Amber Rudd said Wednesday. The carbon budget will be released Thursday, the last day allowed. […]

The leaders of the United States, Canada, and Mexico in a joint announcement Wednesday committed to powering their nations with 50 percent “clean power,” including carbon capture and storage, by 2025. Presidents Barack Obama, and Enrique Peña Nieto of Mexico, and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau of Canada, met in Ottawa for the North America Leaders’ […]

Sweden’s nuclear regulator on Wednesday offered a show of support for plans to establish a permanent repository for spent nuclear fuel near the east coast village of Forsmark. “The Swedish Radiation Safety Authority has assessed that the Swedish Nuclear Fuel and Waste Management Company (SKB) has the potential to comply with the Authority’s nuclear safety […]

Regardless of the U.K.’s decision to scrap its £1 billion carbon capture and storage commercialization competition, the government retained the right to access and share data and knowledge gained from the early stages of the projects that remained in the competition when it closed last year. That information, in the form of five reports covering […]

Businesses could cut their global greenhouse gas emissions by a total of 3.7 billion metric tons of CO2 equivalent a year by 2030, according to a report issued Tuesday by We Mean Business. That amount would equate to 60 percent of the emissions cut pledged in the Paris climate change agreement by nations in their […]

The United Kingdom is moving toward a low-carbon future, and the nation’s vote last week to leave the European Union will not stop that, Jonathan Gaventa, a director at the London-based think tank Third Generation Environmentalism (E3G), wrote in an editorial published Monday n Climate Home. “While the UK may be entering a period of […]

The United Kingdom’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) has awarded nearly £4 million in funding for industrial carbon capture and storage projects, two of which will involve the University of Hull, the university announced Monday. Meihong Wang, and his Process and Energy Systems Engineering research team, will work with consortiums led by Heriot-Watt […]

Rose Gottemoeller, U.S. undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, has been appointed as the next NATO deputy secretary general, Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg announced Monday. Gottemoeller is set to replace former Alexander Vershbow, a veteran U.S. ambassador who has served in that position since 2012, the statement said. Gottemoeller will begin her […]

Mexico’s regulatory framework is not ideal for carbon capture and storage, but it could be adjusted, according to a report released last week by the World Bank. The report explores the potential for developing a regulatory framework for carbon capture, utilization, and storage in Mexico. “A systematic approach was followed for the review of international […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) sent the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine an emergency shipment worth approximately $2.3 million after 29 radiation portal monitors were destroyed in Ukraine in fighting between the government and separatists. NNSA spokeswoman Francie Israeli offered more details by email after a June 17 Government Accountability Office report highlighted the destroyed […]

The fighting between the government of Ukraine and separatists that began in 2014 resulted in the destruction of 29 radiation portal monitors worth $3.9 million that were provided by the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), the agency said this week. The NNSA has no plans to replace these monitors, which are among 84 installed […]

Leadership at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant deliberately avoided disclosing the fact that three reactors had melted down at the Japanese facility during its March 2011 disaster, plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) said Tuesday. “It is extremely regrettable. People are justified in thinking it was a coverup,” TEPCO President Naomi Hirose said […]

SHINE Medical Technologies, which plans by 2019 to open a medical radioisotope production facility in Janesville, Wis., said Tuesday it has reached a supply agreement with China’s largest distributor of radio-pharmaceuticals. SHINE will provide China’s HTA Co. Ltd. with molybdenum-99, a medical isotope that decays into technetium-99m, which is used in imaging procedures for cancer, […]

In a historic vote Thursday, the citizens of the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union. The U.K. has been a member of the European Union (and its precursors) since 1973 and as such teamed up with the 27 other nations in the coalition in preparing for and negotiating December’s Paris climate change agreement. The […]

Two of the largest city-led climate change and energy initiatives in the world, the European Union Covenant of Mayors and the Compact of Mayors, announced Wednesday they are teaming up to create the largest global coalition of cities committed to climate leadership. The new group, the Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate & Energy, will […]

The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC) on Wednesday issued a decommissioning license to Hydro-Québec for its Gentilly-2 nuclear reactor, which operated in Quebec from 1983 to 2012. The license, which allows Hydro-Québec to begin the estimated CAN $1.8 billion decommissioning project, is valid from July 1, 2016, to June 30, 2026. According to an announcement Wednesday, CNSC […]

SHINE Medical Technologies, which plans by 2019 to open a medical radioisotope production facility in Janesville, Wis., said Tuesday it has reached a supply agreement with China’s largest distributor of radio-pharmaceuticals. SHINE will provide China’s HTA Co. Ltd. with molybdenum-99, a medical isotope that decays into technetium-99m, which is used in imaging procedures for cancer, […]

Lithuania has successfully completed cold trials at its new interim spent nuclear fuel storage facility for power units 1 and 2 at the shuttered Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant, State Enterprise Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant announced Monday. Completion of cold testing clears the way for IAE to conduct hot trials at the facility, using spent nuclear fuel, […]

Greenhouse gas emissions in the European Union dropped 4.1 percent from 2013 to 2014, reaching their lowest level since 1990, according to the European Environment Agency’s annual European Union greenhouse gas inventory, released Tuesday. Emissions dropped 24.4 percent from 1990 to 2014, the report finds. “There has been a progressive decoupling of gross domestic product […]

Norway on Monday submitted to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change its instrument of ratification for the Paris climate change agreement, becoming the first European nation to do so — through France is right on its heels, having ratified the agreement on June 15. Until the French instrument of ratification is deposited with […]

Leadership at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant deliberately avoided disclosing the fact that three reactors had melted down at the Japanese facility during its March 2011 disaster, plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) said Tuesday. The company delivered the statement in response to a June 16 report from a committee investigating the delayed acknowledgment of a meltdown […]

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu indicated Monday that his country will ratify the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) when the time is right, although he did not offer specifics on those circumstances. Following a meeting Monday in Jerusalem with Lassina Zerbo, executive secretary of the Preparatory Commission for the CTBT Organization, Netanyahu’s office released a statement […]

The Canadian provinces of Quebec and Saskatchewan will collaborate to accelerate the development and deployment of carbon capture and storage technologies, they announced Friday. Saskatchewan is home to the Boundary Dam Unit 3 CCS project, the world’s first commercial-scale CCS demonstration on a post-combustion coal-fired power plant, as well as the SaskPower Carbon Capture and […]