Posted on 09/15/2011 12:05:51 PM PDT by bananaman22
On 12 September Iran brought its first nuclear power plant in Bushehr online, connecting it to the country's electrical grid. Iranian officials at the opening ceremony said that the 1,000 megawatt plant has begun generating electricity at 40 percent of its capacity and will reach full capacity by the year’s end following further testing.
Quite aside from demonstrating Iran’s touching post-Fukushima faith in nuclear energy despite being a seismically active country, Bushehr represents a Rorschach test of sorts for all the fears and anxieties in the Middle East, in which everyone looking at the facility has his preconceptions reaffirmed.
“Axis of Evil” charter member Iran insists that Bushehr represents the government’s determination to husband is vast oil reserves by promoting other energy sources, as its economy has hammered by more than three decades of U.S.-led sanctions.
Iran has been subjected to increasingly militant rhetoric from both Tel Aviv and Washington over its civilian nuclear energy program, with thinly veiled threats of possible military action if Tehran does not abandon its efforts, even though they are completely complaint under the terms of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which Iran has signed and which Tehran pointedly underlines, it’s nemesis and harshest critic Israel has not.
Russia signed a $1 billion contract in 1995 for building the Bushehr plant and last month the country’s Rosatom supplied the power station’s uranium fuel. The United States urged Russia to delay the startup until Iran proves that it's not developing nuclear weapons, to no avail, as Moscow replied that that the Bushehr project has been closely supervised by the U.N.’s International Atomic Energy Agency.
Russian officials said that Iran had signed a pledge to ship all the spent uranium fuel from Bushehr back to Russia for reprocessing, excluding the possibility that any of it could used to make nuclear weapons.
Russia has insisted that the Bushehr project is essential for persuading Iran to cooperate with the IAEA and fulfill its obligations under international nuclear nonproliferation agreements.
Many aspects of Iran’s uranium enrichment activities trouble the international community, so much so that in June the U.N. Security Council slapped a fourth set of sanctions on Full article at: Iranian Bushehr Nuclear Plant Comes Online
Reading the article and the comments from those people, excuse me, I have to go shower now. I felt like I was drug through raw sewage.
What type of reactor is it? Is it like a breeder that produces Plutonium?
Did they bother with a containment building, it doesn’t say whose design they used but the article mentioned lots of Russians there (1,500). I hope they didn’t buy the plans for a Chernobyl type graphite moderated reactor.
World survives . . . . today.
I know. The headline is rather naive don't you think?
They are complaining about having a new nuclear facility? Who knew? :-)
Civilian nuclear program? Compliant with the non-proliferation treaty?
What about those thousands of centrifuges they’ve got spinning 24/7? What is their civilian purpose, and what section of the non-proliferation treaty authorizes them?
Ya just can’t fix stupid, particularly willfully stupid.
Interesting times . . .
No it isn’t. IIRC from our discussions last September Bushehr is pretty much useless for bombs.
It’s the centrifuges on the other side of Iran that are the biggest problem, and its the centrifuges which (still) have Stuxnet, LOL.
I don't see why they didn't use a breeder design, going from memory, I thought France's reactors were of the breeder type. Again, going from memory, isn't the output of a breeder reactor not only more fuel but weapon's grade Plutonium???
It’s the centrifuges on the other side of Iran that are the biggest problem, and its the centrifuges which (still) have Stuxnet, LOL.
Was stuxnet ever at the nuc plant or was it only at the centrifuges? Stuxnet, kind of like the how weapons systems of the hundred or so F-14s we sold the Shaw suddenly stopped working...
I think Iran has likely got the bomb at least two years ago. The situation isn’t as critical as many may see for Iran for testing the bomb.
On Busher, I think there is nothing important there; if not, Iranians wouldn’t show to the IAEA.
Despite US rhetorics against Iranian nuclear program, I do not think US is so much preoccupied by Iranian bomb but rather by the Pakistani nuclear arsenals. The situation in Pakistan is more critical than in Iran.
Iran will never dare to use such bomb bc the regime’s wish is not to lose power. The religious class in Iran isn’t as irrational as many may believe. They want to keep power. They don’t want to lose the control of Iran. They will never take such risk to attack Israel neither any countries of the region. They know it will be a disaster interiorly as well as with the international
community. The religious class in Iran is cynical but calculator.
Just to finish by Iranian President’s words against Israel. According to the constitution of current regime in Iran, President has more responsibilities than power. The real powerful person in Iran is the Guide of the Revolution (first being Khomeiny and the second, Khamenei) and a group of clergies leading one powerful council that decides who will be the Guide. then what Ahmadinejad says is nothing in Iranian foreign policy’s direction.
If Iran had the bomb they would have announced it. It would do two things it would completely destroy the neocon narrative that Iran is an existential threat to Israel. It would also deter any attack by the US or Israel.
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