jA robot operating deep inside a failed reactor at the stricken Fukushima nuclear plant north of Tokyo has revealed what appears to be stalactites of melted nuclear fuel, the plant’s operator has said. The discovery is considered a key development in the decommissioning process of the plant, which suffered a catastrophic meltdown in 2011 after a huge tsunami swamped the facility.
Operating remotely within submerged parts of the Fukushima Daiichi plant’s Unit 3 reactor, the robot sent back 16 hours worth of images of massive, lava-like fuel deposits on the floor of the pedestal, a part of the reactor that sits underneath and supports the core….The discovery is key to determining how to further advance the cleanup of the plant, a process that is expected to take decades. “This was the first time that we could confirm the status inside the pedestal,” TEPCO spokesperson Maki Murayama said. “This is a big step towards the decommission process.”..
Having entered the stricken Pressure Containment Vessel (PCV) through a pipe designed to prevent the escape of radioactive gas, the robot descended into the cooling water which accumulated following the accident. The device was equipped with thrusters to navigate through the water, and featured front and rear cameras. The small “radiation-hardened, screw-driven” submersible robot was designed to fit through the narrow, 14-centimeter (5.5-inch) diameter entrance of the pipe, according to the Tokyo-based International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning (IRID), which developed the device alongside technology company Toshiba.
As the robot navigates through the ruined reactor, melted equipment and the fuel deposits can be seen.
The mission was launched after previous photographic inspection of the Unit 3 reactor suggested that, “during the accident, fuel assemblies melted from the excess heat, dropping from their original position down to the pedestal area,” according to a statement released by TEPCO.
Excerpt from Euan McKirdy and Yoko Wakatsuki, Fukushima robot reveals first sign of melted fuel in submerged reactor, CNN, July 24, 2017
Seven months after Libyan forces defeated Islamic State in Sirte, hundreds of bodies of foreign militants are still stored in freezers as authorities negotiate with other governments to decide what to do with them, local officials say. The corpses have been shipped to Misrata, a city further to the west whose forces led the fight to defeat Islamic State in Sirte in December 2016.
On June 22nd 2017, 
U.S. District Judge Sue L. Robinson of Delaware on June 21,2017 sided with the federal government in blocking a $367 million merger between EnergySolutions and the radioactive site’s parent company. Waste Control Specialists calls the deal essential for its long-term viability.The details of Robinson’s opinion were sealed.
One day in March 2017, he Rioja Knutsen tanker, filled with liquefied natural gas, was traveling from the U.S. to Portugal. Suddenly, Mexico’s power company lobbed in a higher bid for its cargo. At the Bahamas, the ship abruptly made a starboard turn and headed south. How natural gas is bought and sold in the world’s scattered regional markets for the fuel is changing rapidly. Ships such as the Rioja Knutsen are stitching those regions together and a single global market is emerging. This is already how nearly every other hydrocarbon, from crude oil to obscure petrochemicals, is sold. As gas joins the club, the effects will ripple through energy prices, company profits, the environment and geopolitics.
Russia’s sale of one-fifth of its state-owned oil company to Qatar and commodities giant Glencore PLC last year had an unusual provision: Moscow and Doha agreed Russia would buy a stake back, people familiar with the matter said. Russian President Vladimir Putin hailed the $11.5 billion sale of the Rosneft stake in December 2016 as a sign of investor confidence in his country. But the people with knowledge of the deal say it functioned as an emergency loan to help Moscow through a budget squeeze.
A SpaceX Falcon rocket lifted off from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on May , 2017 to boost a classified spy satellite into orbit for the U.S. military, then turned around and touched down at a nearby landing pad.
Growing numbers of African migrants passing through Libya are traded in what they call slave markets before being held for ransom, forced labour or sexual exploitation, according to the UN migration agency.
Since their invention in the 1960s, disposable plastic bags have made lives easier for lazy shoppers the world over. But once used, they become a blight. This is particularly true in poor countries without good systems for disposing of them. They are not only unsightly. Filled with rainwater, they are a boon for malaria-carrying mosquitoes. Dumped in the ocean, they kill fish. They may take hundreds of years to degrade. On March 15th Kenya announced that it will become the second country in Africa to ban them. It follows Rwanda, a country with a dictatorial obsession with cleanliness, which outlawed them in 2008…
A real-estate magnate is financing Google’s and Facebook Inc.’s new trans-Pacific internet cable, the first such project that will be majority-owned by a single Chinese company. Wei Junkang, 56, is the main financier of the cable between Los Angeles and Hong Kong, a reflection of growing interest from China’s investors in high-tech industries. It will be the world’s highest-capacity internet link between Asia and the U.S.
Several options are available to immobilise waste resulting from nuclear fuel reprocessing. One of these is vitrification – a mature technology which has been used for high-level nuclear waste immobilization for over 50 years…Argentina is considering vitrification as a viable option for dealing with its high-level nuclear waste. The Argentine National Programme for Radioactive Waste Management aims to build capacities to implement vitrification processes for radioactive waste….
On 7 March 2017, WikiLeaks began its new series of leaks on the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency…code-named “Vault 7” by WikiLeaks..
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