AREVA in America: The French Connection

March 21st, 2011 | Natural Resources News Service | | Leave a comment
Spencer Abraham (left) watches President George Bush shake hands with Gov. Tom Ridge after signing two executive orders. Photo: Eric Draper
Spencer Abraham (left) watches President George Bush shake hands with Gov. Tom Ridge after signing two executive orders. Photo: Eric Draper

The French State-owned company has built close relationships with the United States Department of Energy (DOE) over the years. Former U.S. Senator and Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham is the Chairman of the Board of the U.S. branch of AREVA and uses his address book to promote the merits of this State-owned firm.

Spencer Abraham was the head of the Republican Party in Michigan before becoming U.S. Senator for Michigan from 1995 to 2001. When he lost his re-election bid, President George W. Bush named him Energy Secretary. He served from January 2001 to February 2005. One year after he left, Abraham became Chairman of the Board of AREVA Inc. – the U.S. branch of AREVA Group, the French nuclear power giant.

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NYT: New Head of NY Environment Says Go Slow on Fracking

January 6th, 2011 | Environment | | Leave a comment

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo appointed Joseph Martens as the new commissioner of the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation. His department faces challenges to enforcing environmental regulations with a smaller staff and limited budget. Last spring he urged DEC to go slow on fracking until the EPA finished its report.

Read it at NYT.com

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[VIDEO] DOE Keeps Name of Employee Who Ran Security Barrier Secret

December 15th, 2010 | National Security | | Leave a comment

The Aiken Standard reports that the Department of Energy refuse to release the name of an employee who ran a security barrier at the nuclear weapons facility last month. The employee hit another car stopping at the barrier and then flipped over.

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Yucca Mountain Still Alive As Lawsuits Move Forward

December 13th, 2010 | Environment | | Leave a comment

The Yucca Mountain nuclear waste project is not dead? The Los Angeles Times reports that States and nuclear facilities that want to ship radioactive material to the nuclear waste repository have sued to resurrect the disposal plan that Nevada and the Obama administration pledged to end. On December 10, a federal appeals court in Washington issued a ruling that will allow a case to go forward disputing the Obama administration’s authority to kill the project. The case was filed by North Carolina and Washington State, which both have large amounts of waste, among other plaintiffs. 

In the last year of the George H.W. Bush administration, the Department of Energy filed an application for a license to operate Yucca Mountain. But the Obama administration pledged to kill the project by cutting funding and withdrawing the licence application, arguing that the waste canisters inside the mountains would corrode thousand of years prematurely and release radioactivity into the environment. The plan to withdraw the license is being disputed by a licensing board under the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and by the states in the court case.

Read this story at Latimes.com

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